


Android 009

by HanaHimus



Category: Cyborg 009, Kikaider
Genre: Crossover, Gen, Past Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-07
Updated: 2019-01-31
Packaged: 2019-10-06 00:23:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 17
Words: 21,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17335193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HanaHimus/pseuds/HanaHimus
Summary: Jiro was ready to try and move on with his life after the death of his brothers and every other android he had come across... But Ichiro stumbling right back into his life raised too many questions to even allow him to try.Joe Shimamura was trying to live about as normally as a cyborg could when an attack out of nowhere ruins any chance of that.As their paths begin to entagle, each event they experience linking together, it's only a matter of time before they meet.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Did I basically write part of a fic that was like this before? Yes.
> 
> Did I make enough changes to the later ideas for the plot that I felt I needed to restart it? Yes.

Jiro had begun to think he was truly free of his guilt when he was able to find his way back to Mitsuko and her family. Though maybe ‘find his way back’ was the wrong term to be using. He had found himself wandering back towards the ruined remains of their home, expecting to find the place empty and alone as before…

But they’d been there, looking out upon what had happened with confusion clear in their every move. He hadn’t even paused a moment before running towards them, tears in his eyes. He’d made it his goal to find them again, but he never thought they would walk right back into his life…! He’d thought he would have to hunt them down.

Mitsuko and Masaru were overjoyed to see him, running straight into his arms when they noticed him. Mitsuko clung to him, crying for a long time. Masaru refused to let go of his leg for the entire day, even when they went into town to try and find a hotel to stay at.

When they found one and sat down to try and explain everything that had happened, though, things went south rather quickly. Jiro didn’t know how to explain other androids, some made by Doctor Komyoji, others not, and how them coming into his life had led to the destruction of their home. He didn’t know how to describe all the events that transpired that led to it, or the children that were Gill’s, now safely being raised by someone they could trust. And he couldn’t bring himself to reveal the fate of even one of the androids he’d come across in his journey. It hurt too much to even think about.

Thankfully, no one pushed him on the subject, so he didn’t have to think about it too long. But still, even just thinking about him had made a pang run through his chest. Maybe there was still some guilt weighing on him. It was hard to fully forgive yourself for killing your own brothers, after all.

He was still making steps in the right direction, he liked to think. He wasn’t being eaten away at by the guilt at every moment anymore, after all. It was possible to breathe, and enjoy at least the small moments.

Enough so that he agreed to going on vacation with the Komyojis when they revealed their plans to do as much. Apparently, after the destruction of their home, they decided they should go somewhere nice as it was rebuilt. They didn’t want the doctor to become too stressed so shortly after recovery, after all.

They wasted no time packing their bags up again, moving from one hotel to another, quite a distance away from their destroyed home. It was a nice area, with a beach for them to go to if they wanted. 

Sadly, Jiro’s hands were a bit to mechanical and his body a bit too robotic for him to go along, but that was fine. He would stay at the hotel and try and get some rest. He could use a nap, if he was being totally honest.

He let his eyes close, consciousness drifting away…

_ And he was in front of his fallen brothers. Rei and Ichiro, broken as he had left them… Only they weren’t in their battle forms as they had been when he killed them. They were in their human forms, skin and clothes torn, revealing wires and scraps of jagged metal… _

_ He closed his eyes and tried to walk forward, ignore the expressions on their faces. And then his foot hit against something and he felt something in one of his hands. He didn’t want to look at what it was, but he felt as if he was being  _ forced  _ to do just that. _

_ And so they slowly opened. Laying at his feet was yet another brother of his, Saburo. One that he had nearly forgotten about after all this time. His body lay there, also in his human form. An arm and his head missing. _

_ A knot formed in his stomach as he raised his hand, in it, the missing head. _

_ A scream escaped him as he threw it towards the body, backing away as he shook. He backed away, trying to get away from the scene, only to trip over yet another body, falling to the ground. _

_ He looked to see just who it was he tripped on, expecting the body of Rei or Ichiro… But it was a mess of parts, none belonging to any of his brothers. Rieko and Mieko’s remains instead were sprawled in front of him, his stomach twisting as he stared at them. _

_ “This can’t be happening… Things are getting better.” He closed his eyes again, placing his hands on either side of his head. “Things are getting better...” _

_ “Jiro…” The voices of every fallen android began filling his head. That was right, even if he covered his ears, he was sure to hear something. This was a dream, after all… “Jiro, Jiro… Jiro--” _

“Jiro!” His eyes snapped open at the sound of Mitsuko’s voice. “Jiro, are you alright?”

He sat up, brow furrowed. “I’m fine… I just had a bad dream.”

Mitsuko frowned, clearly worried about how vague he was being. “Would you like to talk about it…?”

“No, I’ll be fine.” He shook his head and did his best to give her a reassuring smile. “I think I need to get out of this room, though.”

“Well, how about you come with us to dinner?” Mitsuko’s voice was soft as she offered. “Masaru asked me to come and invite you, and if you need to get out of this room… It’ll be good for both of you. I know you can’t eat, but…”

Jiro thought for a moment before standing, nodding. “Alright, let’s go.”

He walked alongside her, their hands brushing against each other. He felt a little better with her at his side, but his stomach was still in knots. He was sure he wouldn’t be able to shake that feeling easily, either.

But he would do his best to smile for Mitsuko and Masaru. They had worried about him greatly before, and he didn’t want to make that happen again. The last thing he wanted was to cause them more issues, after all.

And so the entire walk there and the entire time they ate, he did his best to keep up with the conversation. Den asked him a few times about things, and he did his best to reply… But it was a bit hard when Masaru kept trying to butt in with how boring he found it. It was honestly adorable watching him trying to keep up. He wished this would never end.

It, of course, did come to an end, though. All things did, after all. When the Komyojis stood to use the restroom and pay, he was once again left in his thoughts. The nightmare was still eating at him, and it wasn’t as easy to ignore without someone there to talk to. He just hoped this wouldn’t become a norm after how far he’d come.

He sighed, standing. Maybe he should wait for them outside, the fresh air could do him some good. A reminder that things were good, the skies blue as birds chirped happy tunes. It was time to leave the past in the past.

He walked outside, sucking in a deep breath, and expelling it slowly. As if trying to expel the thoughts and memories still trying to hold him down. It was time to fully move on--

“Jiro?!” A familiar voice made him snap his attention towards it. He knew that outfit, that hair style, that bike…

“I-Ichiro…?!” Jiro approached his brother without a second thought. “You… How are you here?! You were destroyed!”

“I was told  _ you  _ were destroyed!” Ichiro frowned as he looked his brother over. “But you look just as good as when I last saw you… Hell, even better!”

“I could say the same to you…” Jiro’s brow furrowed. “Did someone rebuild you…?” Who would have the know-how to do that?

“Well, uh…” Ichiro looked around, as if worried someone was listening in. “I’ll have to tell you that later! When I know that cyborg isn’t stalking around somewhere…”

“Cyborg?”

“I’ll tell you later! For now, let’s get somewhere private!”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter, since it hasn't deviated too much from the original version of this fic yet. Though that'll be changing soon enough, lmao.

Joe Shimamura was enjoying the time he wasn’t stuck fighting off threats like Black Ghost with the others quite a bit. Despite everything that had happened (or maybe because of it), it was nice to get a break every once in a while. Chang was happily running a restaurant, Great Britain assisting him and visiting it often; Francoise had picked up a few hobbies in town, including a few she could take Ivan to when he was awake; Doctor Gilmore was pretty hush-hush about what he was doing but he did seem to be enjoying himself…

It was nice. There was almost a sense of normalcy surrounding them and, well, he hoped that was the case for the cyborgs who’d separated from their group, too. They probably all needed times where they could feel at peace like this.

He walked down a path, the area covered in trees. It didn’t seem a very walked path, but it was nice. A lot of nature around to see, animals to hear… Well, to a certain point. After a while, things seemed to get deadly quiet.

That was strange, he’d never seen that happen around here before… It was also kind of worrying, if he was being honest. What was making the sounds that had been nearly constant come to a halt? What was making the animals far and few between?

He was about to take a step off the path to try and see if he could find a clue of what was going on when a fist drove into his gut, with enough strength to make him stagger back. That was stronger than your average punch, was this some sort of cyborg…?

Out from between the trees stepped a man, dressed in black motorcycle suit. His gloves and boots were white, though not a spec of dirt touched them, as if he hadn’t been trudging through the woods. The only color to accent his clothes were the yellow buttons on his jacket and a yellow ascot tied around his neck.

His eyes were covered with shades, though the grin on his face told Joe that he was face to face with someone who was pretty cocky. Maybe he could use that to his advantage.

“You should turn back now.” The man spoke up, pointing towards the way Joe had come. “I have no interest in fighting someone like you, and going any further’ll just get you into trouble.”

Joe frowned, that confirmed something was going on here. “I’m not going to turn back that easily.”

The man clicked his tongue, approaching Joe. “Then I guess I’ll have to make you.”

Without another word, the man threw his leg around, trying to catch Joe in the side of the face. The cyborg was barely able to dodge the attack as he chewed on the idea of using his accelerator. It’d probably help make this go faster, but at the same time, he didn’t want to wear himself out too fast. There could be more after this man, after all.

So he decided against using it, at least for now. He’d been able to dodge the attack when he saw it coming easily enough, after all.

At that point he decided it was time to at least try and go on the offensive. He needed to get through this man to see what was hiding just off the path. He took a running start at him and threw a punch of his own, bringing it up into the man’s chin.

The man took a step back, rubbing his jaw. “Not bad, you’re stronger than I would’ve expected some random passerby to be…”

He moved in on Joe again, grabbing him by the hair and flinging him to the side. He was able to recover quickly enough, but his back hurt when he slammed into the trunk of a tree. Wasting no time, Joe took another run at the man, centering a kick right on the side of his face.

His sunglasses went flying and Joe caught a glance of the man’s eyes before he went after them. Red, definitely inhuman. They were replaced too quickly for him to gleam much else, however.

The man regained himself quickly after that, bearing down on Joe once again. He shoved his shoulder into him, as if trying to throw him off balance with the sudden force. Joe had to admit, it  _ did  _ send him stumbling.

Enough so that the man almost brought his arm down against the back of Joe’s neck… Only to stop suddenly, gripping at his head.

“Not now…” He began to stumble back towards the place in the trees he appeared from. “Bijinder and Waruder’ll just have to deal with you…”

With that, he moved out of view and was replaced by two others. A short haired woman who didn’t seem that excited to be here, and another man with sunglasses who seemed much more excited about this.

At that point Joe decided there were probably enough of them that he couldn’t even scout it on his own. Hell, there could be others creeping around any corner… So he activated acceleration mode and got out of there as fast as he could. Hopefully without being followed.

Soon enough, the home was back in view. Francoise seemed to be leaving, likely to go to that ballet club she had recently joined, but Joe wasted no time ushering her back inside. She was clearly confused, but didn’t argue as he shut and locked the door.

Gilmore, however, took no time speaking up when he saw them. “003, didn’t you just leave to attend your club? And 009, you look as if you’ve seen a ghost!”

Joe shook his head. “Not a ghost, but I think a cyborg or an android or something…? And then more of them.”

“More? Around here?” Francoise gasped as she moved to Joe’s side. “We haven’t had anything like that happen recently…”

“I know, but I’m certain. The first one was too strong and too durable to be completely human.” He frowned, moving to sit on the couch. “And when he ran off, he seemed certain the others who’d come up could do what he was doing.”

“How odd…” Gilmore frowned, concern clear on his face. “Was anything else out of place?”

“The further down the path I went, the less noises there were. I think somethings is hidden out there.”

“003, would you see if you can pick up on anything?” Gilmore looked to the woman.

She nodded and soon enough, she was focusing. Francoise frowned as the two men watched on, waiting for any information she would be able to relay to them… But she simply sighed, shaking her head.

“I can’t pick anything up. It’s either out of range or they’re broadcasting a jamming signal to keep anyone like me out.” She gave them a sympathetic frown. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright, that just means we’ll have to go about this some other way…” Gilmore hummed in thought. “I think it would be best to call the other cyborgs. This could very well be an emergency in the making.”

Joe nodded. It definitely could be… And it’d be better to be together, with strength in numbers. Less chance of any of them being hurt or caught off guard that way. “I guess we should make some phone calls, then.”

Francoise nodded. “I’ll go see if Ivan is still sleeping.”

“Thank you, 003.” Gilmore looked back to Joe. “009, assist me in calling the others back here, please. The sooner they all know, the better.”

Joe nodded, heading for the nearest phone. He’d start with Chang and Great Britain, they needed to know to be careful on their way back that night.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter, woohoo. Rei and Ichiro are so hard for me to write lmfao

Once they were in Jiro’s hotel room, Ichiro seemed a lot more comfortable with the idea of speaking about what was going on. Whatever had made him want to get somewhere away from prying eyes and ears was definitely not here. Good, made Jiro less worried about the Komyojis.

He cleared his throat, trying to forget about them for a just a moment. He needed to find out what was going on with Ichiro. “So… Who rebuilt you, Ichiro?”

“This is gonna sound crazy, but…” Ichiro scratched his chin and sighed. “You remember that doctor? The one who built Bijinder and that wasn’t at all a threat in the end?”

“Vaguely… Doctor Dromeda, was it?” Jiro tilted his head to the side, frowning. The man hadn’t left too much of an impact on him, honestly.

“Yeah…” Ichiro’s face was pink with embarrassment. “I hate to admit it, but… He was the one to remake me. Rei too.”

“What, really?” Jiro couldn’t hide his shock. “Both of you?!”

“Not just us.” Ichiro shook his head. “Bijinder and that Waruder guy too! A-and Rieko, believe it or not! He made me and Rei tell him where we buried her, the bastard…”

Jiro felt sick to his stomach. “Really…? What about that cyborg you mentioned?”

Ichiro’s expression darkened even more, if that was even possible. “It’s Hakaider. He rebuilt Hakaider, too. Probably since the bastard was working with SHADOW, too!”

That made Jiro worry. Hakaider had always been a menacing foe, and knowing he’d been rebuilt was even worse. What kind of brain was in control of the body now, he had to wonder? One more ruthless than Gill…? The very thought made him shudder.

“That sounds bad… We should do something about it.” He finally spoke, trying to regain his composure. “It seems like you guys are allowed to wander about…”

“Only to stake out the city for whatever he has planned!” Ichiro pouted. “And we have curfews… What are we, children?!”

Jiro had to bite back a comment about the fact that Ichiro could indeed be like a child. “That sounds bad… Is there anyway you can get at least Rei here? Preferably Rieko and Bijinder, too… We might be able to come up with a plan to stop him!”

“That’s not a bad idea…” Ichiro rubbed his chin. “I’ll see what I can do!”

With that, they parted ways for a while. Lucky that, too, seeing as shortly after Masaru came to his door, having borrowed the keycard he’d lent Mitsuko in case they ever needed him. He was more than a little upset about Jiro ditching them at the restaurant, it seemed.

“Jiro! You can’t run off like that!” There were tears welling in his eyes as he slammed a fist into his leg. “I… I thought…”

Jiro blinked. “What did you think?”

“I thought you left again!” His voice was full of tears as he clung to Jiro. “I thought I’d never see you again!”

“I’m sorry, Masaru…” He pushed Masaru back long enough to kneel down and hug the boy. “I didn’t mean to scare you like that. Something just came up and I didn’t think about anything but figuring out what to do about it.”

“What is it?” Masaru pulled himself back to look at Jiro. “Tell me what came up!”

“I can’t tell you that, not yet.” He let his eyes wander away, unable to look the boy in the eyes. “It could be dangerous, and I don’t want to get your family too involved in it until it’s fixed.”

“But that means you might have to go away…”

“No, no!” He shook his head. “The problem is around here, so I’ll have it done before we go back home!”

...Hopefully the gigantic vacation would be enough time to figure all of this out. He’d hate to have to stay behind and separate from them all again, after such a short amount of time together.

“You promise?”

“I… Can’t do that, but I’ll do my best.”

That was clearly not the answer Masaru was looking for, as he began to cry again, calling Jiro stupid and telling him he hated him. It hurt… But Jiro couldn’t blame the boy, not really. He was about to put the Komyojis through a lot of grief if he didn’t handle this quickly and carefully…

And with Ichiro around? Well, it might be hard to do things carefully.

Masaru ran off at that point, still clearly upset. Jiro thought about following after him… But he couldn’t. He needed to wait here for when Ichiro came back with (hopefully) the three androids he’d asked him to grab.

So instead he went to sit by the window. He stared out across the city with a frown. It was still light out, but soon enough the sun was starting to set. People came and went past the window, but none really caught his eye.

Well, a plump older man and what seemed to be his partner of some sort kind of did. If only because they seemed to be discussing something seriously. Usually men like this wouldn’t strike Jiro as the super serious type (they sorta reminded him of Hanpei)... He hoped nothing was wrong.

Especially when they didn’t even react to when Ichiro pulled up and bumped right into the taller one’s shoulder. Jiro frowned. He’d have to tell his older brother to at least try and have some basic manners…

But for now, he just moved away from the window, opening the door and peeking out. He hadn’t seen anyone with Ichiro, so he couldn’t help but be concerned. Had he not even been able to get Rei…?

Soon enough, Ichiro came strolling down the hall, hands behind his head. For a moment, Jiro truly did think he was alone… But then Rei appeared, trailing behind Ichiro. The same, neutral expression he always wore on his face.

Jiro lit up, running into the hallway and hugging both of his brothers close to him. “Rei! I’m so happy to see you!”

Rei pat Jiro’s back lightly. “It’s nice to see you, too.”

“We can’t stay long…” Ichiro’s pats against Jiro’s back were rougher. “That stupid curfew is getting close, and I don’t want Hakaider to come looking for us.”

“Well, that could be bad… But wouldn’t we see him coming?” Jiro frowned as he pulled away from his brothers. “I mean, it’d be hard to miss a cyborg with a brain showing.”

“He has a human form, just like the rest of us.” Rei spoke up, shrugging. “Even has a name he goes by when he uses it.”

Jiro felt like the world came to a halt when his younger brother said that. “A name…? W-what name does he use?”

Ichiro frowned, clearly confused. “Saburo. He even calls us brothers, for some reason. I get Komyoji made the design or whatever, but a cyborg piloted by a human brain isn’t even close to being able to call himself that!”

Jiro could barely register the words Ichiro was saying. “...Not being piloted by the brain.”

Rei tilted his head to the side. “What did you just say?”

“He’s not being piloted by the brain.” Jiro shook his head. “It’s an AI that’s piloting him right now… Mine and Ichiro’s little brother, Saburo.”

“What?!” Ichiro put his hands on Jiro’s shoulder, shaking him. “You’re joking!”

Jiro shook his head. “No, I’m not… And I’m not sure what to do. I’m sure he still wants me dead like he did before…” That’d make this all a lot harder…

“He wants you specifically dead…?” Rei hummed a bit. “You went through quite the adventures before you met us, didn’t you?”

“That’s one way to put it, uh…” Jiro took a few steps back, trying to gather himself. “I think you guys should go back for now. We should meet up as early as we can tomorrow and… We’ll figure out what to do about it.”

Though he might have to drag Doctor Komyoji into this. He didn’t like that, he’d wanted to leave the Komyojis out of this as much as possible… He would have to make up for this later.


	4. Chapter 4

The calls had gotten the other cyborgs to hop into action quickly enough, the rest of them all appearing throughout the next morning. Jet and Geronimo Junior were first, showing up at the door together and wasting no time settling down while waiting for the others to show up (though Junior was clearly less impatient about it). Albert was next, though Pyunma followed shortly after. The German had barely sat down when the eighth cyborg soldier arrived at the doorstep.

“Now that you’re all here, I suppose it’s time to explain everything in more detail.” Doctor Gilmore took a seat, looking out across the group of cyborgs.

“You said something about there being other cyborgs or something around, right?” Jet was the first to speak up, leaning forward. “What else can you tell us about them?”

“Well…” Joe took over at that point. “They look just like any of us, so they’re nothing like Cyborg 0011 or anything. There were at least three, but I only saw one for more than a few moments, and even then I was fighting him for half the time….”

“Any sort of weaknesses you could see?” Pyunma tilted his head to the side. “Some sort of design flaw?”

Joe thought for a moment. “No glaring weaknesses, but he suddenly started staggering before I ran. I have no clue why, though.”

“That so…?” Albert stroked his chin in thought. “Guessing the same lack of weaknesses can be said of the others you saw too, then.”

“I’m guessing so, yeah.” Joe nodded. “I didn’t see them in action, though, so I can’t be sure.”

“We’ll have to be careful.” Junior was the next to speak, voice quiet. “We don’t know much about the enemy.”

“Agreed.” Francoise nodded as she cradled Ivan in her arms. “If we rush into this, we might just get hurt.”

“We can’t just sit around, either.” Jet crossed his arms. “If this is dangerous, it needs dealt with, before it gets worse.”

“Hmmm… They’re both right, you know!” Chang spoke up next. “Be too quick and one of us could get hurt, be too careful and things could get more out of hand.”

Gilmore gave a worried hum. “Those are both good points. Perhaps for now we should try and patrol the immediate area. Once we’re sure that’s safe, we can plan accordingly.”

“Better than sitting around, at least.” Jet stood up. “I got the air!”

“And I’ll assist him with that.” Great Britain stood with a great flourish, hand against his chest. “There’s too much sky for one person to check it all.”

Pyunma was next to move. “I’ve got the surrounding water covered.”

“I’ll take the ground, then.” Joe spoke up, taking a step forward. “We should all stay in contact while we make our rounds.”

All four of them nodded and soon enough, they were heading out. Pyunma dived into the ocean quickly enough, Jet and Great Britain were in the skies before Joe could really blink, and he was soon enough patrolling the area. It was quiet, so far. Not in the creepy lack of all noises way, but in the totally normal day sort of way.

It seemed the area closest to their home was secure, but… Joe wanted to check a little farther. It would be best to note even the smallest issues that could be seen, even if they turned out to be nothing in the end.

And man, did he hope anything too close to their home ended up being nothing.

“I’ll be going a bit farther now. To make sure we have a good buffer.” He waited for a confirmation from the others before continuing on his way.

Things seemed alright, he was closing in on the road that led to town. It was just as quiet as it usually was this time of year. Barely anyone coming even close to the beach, only a car or two driving by. Maybe they were only stationed in that wooded area...

“Excuse me…!” A woman’s voice hit his ears and he turned to see he was being approached.

She looked fairly normal, someone who could easily be living somewhere in the city. Her hair was long, down to her shoulders, some of it held back with a hairband. From her black flats to her purple jacket, she looked as if she had just stepped off the main road. Despite her clean appearance, however, she seemed nervous.

“Ah, yes?” Joe was lucky he’d decided to not do the patrol in his uniform, out of worry of being seen like this. “Can I help you?”

“M-maybe…” She came to a halt a few steps away from Joe. “Can you point me in the direction of the nearest city?”

So she didn’t live around here. A hitchhiker, maybe? Or was she like that man and the others he’d seen yesterday? It was hard to tell, but she seemed unassuming enough. A bit on edge, but not dangerous.

“Sure, if you go straight ahead--”

“There you are, Rieko.” Another voice, one Joe had heard before, cut through the air. “You know you’re not allowed to wander off.”

Soon enough, the man who’d fought Joe came into view. The woman, apparently named Rieko, tensed. “Ha-- Saburo. I just needed some fresh air…”

“Nice try, but I heard you asking about the city.” He put a hand on her shoulder. “You can’t pull the wool over my eyes that easily.”

“Um…”

“Excuse me.” Joe couldn’t stand to just watch this anymore. The guy was being overbearing, for one, and it looked like this woman could be a clue in what was going on around here, and he wanted to question her some. “We were in the middle of a conversation.”

“Huh?” The man looked over at him with a frown. “Who’re you supposed to be?”

“Just a stranger I was asking for directions.” Rieko stepped in front of him. “No one you need to worry about, Saburo.”

Joe frowned. What, had the man forgotten about the fact they’d been trading blows just yesterday? Or maybe he was just acting like he had. He did seem more focused on the Rieko woman than he did anything else right now, after all… Picking a fight would probably take too much of that focus.

“That so?” Saburo gripped her arm and turned away. “Then your conversation shouldn’t be too important that it can’t be ended right now.”

Joe frowned. “You can’t just--”

Rieko held up a hand and shook her head, eyes filled with a plea for him to not say anything more as she was dragged away. He bit his tongue, taking a step back. Fighting this man again, when the group had agreed to be somewhat cautious, seemed like it could be a bad idea… So he complied.

Soon enough, they were out of sight, leaving Joe to finish his patrol in silence. It looked like he wouldn’t be reporting the area as totally fine when he got back, though. The people could pop up anywhere…

At least he could put a name to a face now, and maybe he could find that Rieko woman again at some point. She might be able to give more information on just what the situation was, and the sooner they knew what was going on, the better.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter, the longest one yet haha.
> 
> Knowing all the versions of Hanpei made writing him so weird. They all mush in my head.

Ichiro and Rei had gotten to Jiro’s door at around noon the next day, much later than he had hoped for. He frowned at them without meaning to; it was hard to try and hide his displeasure about this. Ichiro seemed to totally miss it, but Rei was quick to catch on.

“Rieko snuck out at some point. Doctor Dromeda kept everyone but Waruder and Hakaider in lockdown until she was found.” He began to explain their lateness. “Curfew was also shortened, so we should start figuring things out now.”

Jiro nodded. “Ah, yes. Well I thought about what we could do and… I think we’ll have to talk to Doctor Komyoji. I can’t figure out how else to deal with another robotics genius.”

“You think he could be helpful?” Ichiro crossed his arms, head tilted to the side.

“Mmhmm. He made all of us and Hakaider, after all. And he worked for Professor Gill long enough he might have some clue about Rieko, too.” Jiro had thought on this far too long. “Bijinder and Waruder aren’t exactly his creations, but I think I’ve told him enough about what we know about their abilities that he may have some ideas as to what to do.”

“That’s a good point, I guess…” Ichiro grumbled a bit after admitting that. Things about being left in a statue for years being the worst or something.

Jiro put a hand on his shoulder and smiled. “It’ll be fine, Ichiro. I’m sure he’ll be happy to see you two doing so well for yourselves!”

“I don’t know if he’d react like that or not when he sees an old prototype functioning.” Rei spoke up at that point. “I’d expect shock of some sort.”

“Well, I at least mentioned that you two had been active and helping me when recounting what happened after I last saw the Komyojis, actually.” Jiro wrung his hands together. “Though I didn’t share all of the, uh, details.”

“Details?” Ichiro furrowed his brow. “What details?”

Jiro said nothing and an uncomfortable silence fell over them. They didn’t want to ask further and he didn’t want to say anything else on the topic…

“Let’s go talk to the doctor.” Jiro finally spoke up, the topic back on Komyoji. The others didn’t argue as he stepped out of the room, pulling the door closed behind him.

They followed quietly, pausing as Jiro did to watch Mitsuko and Masaru walk down the hall, in beach-ready gear. If things weren’t so bad right now, he’d be excited to see them, ready to introduce them to his brothers. He was sure they would all get along if they met under non-stressful circumstances…

He just had to make that possible.

“Doctor?” He knocked on the door before using the extra key he’d been given to open it. “I need your help.”

Doctor Komyoji was sitting up in bed, clearly trying to rest. That just made Jiro feel even worse about having to drag him into this. If only he had more of a clue as to what to do about any of this on his own…

“Ah, what do you--” He blinked a few times at the sight of Rei and Ichiro. “A-are there people behind your or are my eyes playing tricks on me?”

“We’re real!” Ichiro spoke up. “Don’t know if you’d remember me, though, old man.”

“Of course I remember you, Ichiro.” He sat up a bit straighter. “You were the first completed Kikaider prototype!” He looked to Rei. “And you… You must be who Jiro called Kikaider 00.”

He nodded. “Yes, completed long after I was deemed unsuccessful.”

There was no malice in Rei’s words, the statement spoken more as just a matter of fact, but Komyoji grimaced either way. As if there was a sliver of guilt within him for not completing Rei when he now saw him functioning… Jiro wanted nothing more than to give him time to absorb all this, but they were on a time limit.

“Doctor Komyoji, it’s not just these two.” He spoke up, pulling the man out of his thoughts. “There are others, ones that I’m not sure are on our side…”

“Four others.” Rei spoke up. “Rieko and Bijinder might be willing to work with us if we can prove ourselves to them.”

“Yeah! Rieko would probably join us as long as she knew we could get her away from the others and Bijinder…” Ichiro paused, frowning. “I dunno, maybe if she saw Jiro or we could be sure we could deal with Waruder and Hakaider--”

“Hakaider?!” Komyoji’s face drained of all color at the name. “He’s back, again?!”

Jiro looked at his hands. “Yes. A third time… And this time it’s not the brain in charge. I’m not sure if you remember the AI that you were influencing when your brain was placed in the body, but--”

“Of course I remember Saburo.” His voice was full of melancholy as he cut Jiro off. “I had so many hopes for him, if I hadn’t failed…”

“Yeah, well, it’s him!” Ichiro frowned. “He’s probably the biggest issue…”

“Perhaps…” Komyoji thought for a moment before shaking his head. “No, no, that wouldn’t work…”

“What were you considering?” Rei tilted his head to the side, arms crossed against his chest. “We should discuss any possibilities.”

“Agreed.” Jiro put a hand on his shoulder. “Please, Doctor, even if it won’t work, talking about it might lead to something that will.”

“Well…” Komyoji looked at his hands. “I suppose I would have to tell you this eventually. When I was forced to design Hakaider for Gill… I made sure the initial frame didn’t follow the schematic I submitted to him.”

“Why’d you do that?” Ichiro frowned. “Were you gonna put a bomb in there and blow it up in his face?”

“Nothing like that.” He shook his head and let out a shaky sigh. “I… left room for a Conscience Circuit. I planned on getting the schematics from Jiro’s guitar, where I hid them, but…”

He went quiet and Jiro gave his shoulder a light squeeze, despite his head reeling. “It’s alright, Doctor you… Don’t need to go into detail about anything else. I just never would have realized Saburo could have had something like that.”

“He doesn’t seem like he could, does he?” Komyoji began to speak again. “Yet I, for just a moment, thought that maybe I could… Make one for him now. If you could just disarm him long enough for me to insert one in him, he could be different…”

“Well, why not?” Rei crossed his arms. “Jiro told me the schematics for them were uploaded to a computer in your home. Did you not take a copy with you when you left?”

“I did, but I fear it may be too late.” Komyoji put his face in his hands. “He may be too steeped in violence already…”

“We should try anyway!” Ichiro spoke as if that was  _ obvious _ . “I mean, he seems to like coming back, so I don’t think we can just kill him or something. If we just, I dunno, chop off his legs long enough to get something in him that’ll get him to stop being evil, why not? If it doesn’t work we can just chop the legs off again!”

“That… Could work.” Jiro blinked a few times before looking to Komyoji. “What do you say, Doctor? Do you think we could at least try?”

“I suppose, but I’m not sure I could do much here.” He shook his head. “I do have the schematics, but I wouldn’t have the parts needed to even begin construction.”

“I saw a lot of spare parts stores and other stores like it.” Rei spoke up. “If you give us a list, we may be able to find at least enough for a partial circuit.”

“Would that be possible, Doctor?”

“I suppose…” He moved to stand at that point. “We could at least try.”

Soon enough, he had a piece of paper out and was scribbling down parts for the androids to try and hunt down. After a few moments, he handed it to Jiro, along with a large chunk of money. Looking at the list, he was worried some of this would be impossible to find, but… Some should be easy enough to hunt down.

“We’ll be as fast as possible!”

“Good luck, Jiro…”

With that, they left and headed out on the town. They shopped around for a while and, thankfully, they got at least half the list marked off. All of them looking had made that easy enough, at least.

Jiro was actually thinking they’d get through it all within an hour or so when a familiar voice made him jump.

“Mister Jiro!” Hanpei was upon him, squeezing him in a hug, before he could even think of anything to say in reply. “I never thought I’d see you again!”

“Hanpei…!” Jiro finally regained himself and awkwardly returned the hug, thoughts of completing the shopping quickly going out the window. “I didn’t expect to see you here!”

“Well, that’s just how it is sometimes… A case can lead me almost anywhere!” He paused. “I just didn’t think I’d actually finally find you!”

“You were looking for me?”

Hanpei released Jiro, wiping tears from his eyes. “I was! Oh, Mister Jiro… I was starting to think I’d never see you again!”

“Hanpei--”

“Jiro, we still have more shops to check.” Rei spoke up, cutting through the moment like a knife.

“Idiot!” Ichiro kicked him in the leg. “We could’ve gone ahead and started looking! Now we’re gonna have to wait until--”

Hanpei’s brow furrowed. “Mister Jiro, who are these two?”

“Introductions…”

Ignoring Ichiro’s pained groan of the word, Jiro gestured to them. “These are my brother units, Rei and Ichiro. Rei, Ichiro… This is Hanpei, Mitsuko hired him to find me shortly after my activation.”

“Brother units?!” Hanpei’s shocked exclamation hurt Jiro’s ears. “I didn’t know you had those! Well, besides that one…”

“They were a surprise to me, too.” Jiro gave an awkward laugh. “We’re actually in the middle of shopping for parts to help with the one you know about.”

“Oh! Let me help you!” Hanpei wasted no time jumping on this chance. “For a low, low price of one thousand yen, I’ll assist you!”

Jiro glanced back at his brothers, they didn’t seem very interested in letting him tail along… But it was nice to see such a friendly face again. It was hard for Jiro to try and tell him no. Hopefully Ichiro and Rei wouldn’t be too mad if he just…

“We’d love the help, Hanpei!”


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter... At this point I'm just trying to finish this so I can reach a New Year's resolution of finishing a multi-chapter fic lmao

“So, that’s all we know… We’re going to have to move quickly if they seem to be moving closer to the house.” Gilmore sighed, shaking his head. “I was afraid that would be the case.”

“I’m guessing that woman 009 saw won’t be much help if she was dragged away…” Pyunma frowned. “So unless we get lucky and one of us run into her, that’ll be a dead end."

“If we had more time that lead would probably be more useful.” Albert spoke up, leaning against the couch. “But for now, we might need to focus on trying to stake out the area 009 found initially.”

“I’m worried about that…” Francoise was the next to speak. “I don’t think we would all be able to stay in contact and we can’t all go for a stakeout…”

Junior let out a thoughtful hum. “We’ll have to choose who does it carefully.”

“Well--”

Before Joe could say anything, a frantic knock sounded at the door. They all paused, staring at it and each other. No one wanted to make a move to answer as Francoise began to try and decipher if whoever it was was a threat.

“It’s a woman… And she looks how 009 described that Rieko woman!” She finally spoke up, eyes wide. “She seems scared…”

“Well, does she seem to be alone?” Chang started towards the door. “If she is, we shouldn’t leave the poor thing outside!”

They all looked at each other again before Gilmore spoke again. “Go ahead and let her in, 006.”

As soon as the door was open, the woman ran in, pushing the door shut behind her. Her breathing was heavy, but she still looked as impeccable as before. “Thank you…”

“You were the woman asking for directions…” Joe approached her. “Funny seeing you again today.”

She turned towards him, mouth opened in the shape of a shocked ‘o’ as she stared. “I didn’t realize this was your home…”

Francoise was standing now, having given Ivan to Junior. She put her hands on Rieko’s shoulders and started guiding her towards the couches. “You seem frazzled. How about you sit down and I get you some tea.”

“No, I don’t need tea… I…” She sucked in a breath. “I just need to get to town. Point me in the direction of the nearest town!”

“Now, now, Miss!” G.B. made his way to her side to help Francoise is guiding her. “No need to rush so much. We actually need to talk to you.”

“You don’t understand.” She shook her head. “You’re all in danger as long as I stay here!”

Jet frowned. “What’re you talking about?”

“There’s no time to explain--”

“There’s plenty of time!” Chang walked up behind her and was the final push needed to get Rieko sitting. “We may not look it, but we can take care of ourselves if danger comes this way!”

Rieko frowned, staring at her hands. “...Are you sure you’d be able to handle androids?”

“Androids…?” Pyunma frowned. “So that’s what we’re dealing with?”

“What?” She looked up, brow furrowed. “Do… Do you all know what’s going on then?”

“Not fully, but we know that guy was attacked.” Jet gestured towards Joe. “And that’s enough for us to look into it.”

“You were attacked?!” Rieko looked at him, worry clear in her eyes. “Who attacked you?”

“Um… Well, you know that man, the one you called Saburo?” Joe scratched his chin. “When I was walking through a wooded area, he attacked me.”

“You must have been getting close to the base if Hakaider attacked you…” She stood, making her way to him. “He didn’t hurt you, though? I would think that Hakaider could easily kill a human…”

“Well, that’s the thing. We’re not exactly humans.”

Junior spoke, clarifying the statement. “We’re cyborgs.”

“I see…” Rieko looked at her feet. “If you aren’t humans, either. I suppose there’s no reason to not explain things in more detail.”

“Please, go ahead.”

Rieko turned to look at the rest of the cyborgs, hand clasped against her chest. “There is a robotics expert around here, Doctor Dromeda. He rebuilt all the androids and sole cyborg he could find after the apparent destruction of a group he was working for, SHADOW…”

“I see…” Albert looked Rieko over. “Are you his assistant?”

She shook her head. “No… I’m one of the androids he rebuilt. As well as his own creations, Waruder and Bijinder and the creations of Doctor Den Komyoji, Kikaider 01, Kikaider 00, and of course Hakaider. He plans on using us to wreak havoc until he can find a new group to sponsor him.”

“What?!”

“He has the others guarding the base or staking out the nearest town or city. He wants to pick the prime time to force us to attack.” Rieko’s lower lip quivered. “Whenever it will cause the most destruction and the most death. I’ve been trying to get away in hopes of getting an evacuation started!”

“Well, now that you’ve clued us in, we can take care of it instead.” Joe put a hand on her shoulder and gave a reassuring smile. “Don’t worry, we won’t let anything happen to the city!”

“Really?” Rieko’s face was still filled with worry. “But what if--”

Before she could finish voicing her concern, the door was knocked off its hinges and the cyborgs all sprung up. Junior passed Ivan back to Francoise as the dust settled and they saw who was standing there.

It seemed to a be an android, with the vague shape of a woman. She was mostly pink and red, gold and blue accenting the colors. She was frowning as she approached Rieko, the other barely moving out of her grasp.

“There you are, you have to come back…” The android spoke. “Come on.”

“I don’t think so.” Joe stepped between the two of them, frowning. “We know what you’re planning and you’re going to stop you!”

She frowned. “You really don’t think you can stop it, do you?”

“Well, why not?” Jet stood, reaching for the gun at his side. “You androids are going down!”

A sigh escaped the android as she shook her head. “I’m guessing you won’t listen to reason if I tell you that you can’t do it, then.”

“We have to at least try.”

“Then I’ll have to stop you.” With that, her eyes began to glow. Rieko fell to the ground first, unable to move. It took a bit longer to affect the others, but soon enough they were all falling to the ground too with thuds. What in the hell…?


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter... Action scenes are hard :,)
> 
> Also did I include something that only Toku Saburo (and ig that 02 manga too but I haven't read that yet) has? Yeah, because my city now.

There were four or five parts that were just impossible to find. Jiro felt bad about that, but at least they found most of it… Now all they needed to do was get it all back to Doctor Komyoji, and let him work his magic. And of course, after that, face Saburo…

At least he had some time to prepare for that.

“Mister Jiro…!” Hanpei suddenly began tugging on his sleeve, moving behind him. “L-look…!”

He glanced towards Hanpei’s pointing figure and if he had blood, it would be running cold. Standing there was a familiar figure, staring right back at him. Saburo, slowly raising a hand to gesture him to go over there as he leaned against his bike.

“Hanpei…” Jiro placed the parts he was carrying into his hands, along with the key to Doctor Komyoji’s room. “I need you to deliver these, as quickly as you can.”

“B-but…!”

"Ichiro and Rei will lead you, go!”

Soon enough, he was running off, but… Ichiro and Rei didn’t follow suit. Instead just piling on their own share of the parts and pointing him in the right direction. Jiro could feel worry building in his chest as they turned to towards Saburo.

“You two should get away too!”

“No way are we leaving you to deal with Hakaider on your own!” Ichiro shook his head. “He’s a total pain to fight, it’d just feel wrong to leave you on your own.”

“He’s less likely to do severe damage if there’s three of us.” Rei added his own thoughts, his tone as even as ever. “It’s safer this way.”

“I guess so…” He looked back to Saburo. Still standing there, waiting. He doubted it’d stay like that for long. “Let’s get this over with, then.”

He started towards his brother, Ichiro and Rei following shortly behind him, and things were clearly going to turn into a fight. Saburo lowered his body into a fighting stance and Jiro picked up speed. If he could get the first hit in, maybe this wouldn’t go too badly.

But Saburo was ready for him, deftly side-stepping and driving his fist into Jiro’s gut as he tried to recover. Ichiro tried to cover for Jiro, trying to land a kick to Saburo’s back, but the cyborg was ready for it, twisting around and nearly crushing his foot as he threw him back.

“Don’t get in the way! My only interest is in Kikaider!” Saburo’s words were laced with venom as he drove his foot into Ichiro’s head. “Stay out of it!”

Rei ignored Saburo’s words, grabbing at his leg and knocking him off his feet for a moment as Ichiro scrambled away. Saburo, however, wasted no time grabbing Rei’s arm himself, throwing him over his head before standing up.

“You don’t know how to listen, do you?!” He made his way towards Jiro, kicking Rei in the gut as he went. “I have no interest in you two, only Kikaider!”

“You two, please… Please stay down!” Jiro pleaded to his brothers as Saburo closed it. “I can handle this on my own!”

“But Jiro…!”

“Ichiro, please!” He blocked a punch from Saburo. “Trust me!”

With that, Ichiro and Rei both seemed to stop trying to get up to assist in the fight. Good, Jiro could be sure they wouldn’t get broken while fighting… The last thing he wanted was for them to be broken again because of him.

He blocked the next blow from Saburo, gripping the cyborg’s arm. Soon enough, he had both of Saburo’s arms in his grip, though it wouldn’t take him too long to get out, if how strongly he was jerking them was anything to go by.

Saburo brought his knee up into Jiro’s chest, hard enough that he released his grip on the arms. Before he could recover, Saburo’s foot was brought down on his head, knocking him to the ground.

For a moment, the thought of switching forms crossed Jiro’s mind. If he could do that, he might be able to overpower Saburo long enough to at least get away… But no. There was also the chance things would get more destructive if he did that, and if he could avoid that, he would. Switching forms would be a last resort.

“Is that all you have, Kikaider?” Saburo’s voice was laced with venom as he mocked his older brother. “Are you more of a piece of junk than when I last saw you? I didn’t even know that was possible!”

Jiro grit his teeth, glaring up at Saburo. “This is far from all I’ve got…!”

“Then prove it to me!” He dug his heel in, forcing Jiro’s face into the dirt. “Show me what you can do, change.”

He pushed Saburo off of him, the cyborg stumbling as he pulled himself to his feet. “I don’t have any reason to do that.”

“Isn’t the fact you’re barely keeping yourself together reason enough?” Saburo titled his head to the side as he recovered. “If you keep it up, I’ll have destroyed you before things can get fun.”

Jiro said nothing, instead taking the offensive, throwing himself at Saburo. His fist connected with his gut, but Saburo barely reacted. It seemed he’d been given an upgrade when he was rebuilt. That was bad.

Saburo grabbed his hand again, pulling hard enough that it felt as if his arm was going to rip off. Of course, Saburo didn’t have the strength alone to do that, but the feeling by itself was enough to keep Jiro’s guard down long enough for Saburo to dig a dagger into his shoulder.

The weapon was clearly made to pierce through any robotic body, just like that Hakaider Shot of his, and soon enough, Jiro felt his arm dislodge. It was just about on the ground when Ichiro and Rei decided to ignore Jiro’s pleas again, moving in to pry Saburo off of Jiro.

He didn’t have any problems letting them do just that, either, pulling himself free of Rei’s grasp and retreating a ways. “That was a warning, Kikaider. If you aren’t willing to go all the way, it won’t be your arm that you almost lose next time.”

Without another word, Saburo hopped onto the bike and took off, leaving the brothers alone.

“What do we do now? Return to Komyoji?” Rei looked over at Jiro, tilting his head to the side.

“No, that’s too dangerous… We have to make sure Saburo isn’t around before we go back there.” He shook his head. “This should stay between us and him, after all…”

Ichiro frowned, grabbing Jiro by his good arm and helping him walk along. “Where should we go instead?”

“...Let’s go to the beach.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter. Finally the MCs of both Android Kikaider and Cyborg 009 meet lmfao. Only took until about halfway through the fic.

The cyborgs, try as they might, couldn’t pull themselves off the ground. It was clear that this android had some sort of ability that allowed her to disrupt the systems of their body… And Rieko, being totally mechanical, was the most affected.

“Bijinder… Please…!” She forced her head up. “We don’t have to listen to Doctor Dromeda…!”

Bijinder didn’t seem even a bit affected by the words. “And if we don’t listen to him, what happens then? You know the answer, Rieko.”

“But…” Her head fell against the ground with a hard clunk. It seemed as if she had given up.

Joe grit his teeth, trying to click his accelerator on, to no avail. It was stuck in the off position, as if whatever was keeping them on the ground was jamming everything they could do to get away.

That was when the feeling suddenly lifted and a voice filtered through his head. 

_ “We need to get out of here, quickly.”  _ Ivan had awoken in the nic of time.  _ “Hurry!” _

The cyborgs and Rieko were quick to move, guiding Gilmore along with them. Bijinder, however, wasn’t quite ready to let them go, even if her signal was being blocked. A laser shot from her breasts quite nearly hit Rieko, though before anyone could react, she was moving out of the way and landing a blow on the back of Bijinder’s neck.

“Let’s go, while she’s down!” Rieko turned to look at them, a foot on Bijinder’s back.

They didn’t have to be told twice, everyone running out of the house one by one, Rieko being the last one, to ensure Bijinder stayed on the ground. They didn’t stop moving until they were far down the beach, enough so that they couldn’t see their home.

“This is bad…” Jet was the first to speak, a frown on his face. “We left her in the house! Who knows what’ll happen to it!”

“It should be fine. She’s looking for me, so she has not reason to do anything to it.” Rieko looked at her feet. “I’m sorry, though. I knew I should have gotten directions and left.”

“We were the ones who insisted on asking you questions.” Junior spoke up, placing a hand on her shoulder. “It wouldn’t be right for you to blame yourself for this.”

“He’s right.” Albert nodded. “For now, we should focus on trying to make sure we know everything we need to know in order to take care of this problem.”

“Agreed.” Pyunma gave a hum. “This just means we need to take care of this as quickly and carefully as we can.”

“Well, then, young lady!” Chang walked over to her, placing a hand on her arm. “Can you tell us anything else about this Dromeda? Maybe what the group he worked for was like?”

“Oh, uh…” Rieko shook her head. “I know that SHADOW wanted to build something, using plans on the backs of two children.”

“What did they want to build?”

Her lower lip quivered. “...I’d rather not say. I don’t have all the details, anyway.”

“Well, what details do you know?” G.B. tilted his head to the side. “Anything can help us right now, my dear. The more we know about the group, the easier it’ll be to figure out just how cutthroat this Dromeda bloke is.”

“I really can’t help you with that.” Rieko shook her head. “I don’t know enough! I was destroyed too early on to be sure anything I do know is right… I don’t even know if Akira…”

Her words broke off, a pain and worry filled whimper taking over. It seemed like a sore spot for her… Joe felt bad, but they really could use some more information. They needed to handle this quickly, so she would stay out of danger and so they could go back to their lives the best they could.

“Rieko, can you please try and tell us more?” He finally spoke up, giving her a confident look. “I’m sure anything you do know will at least push us in the right direction!”

Rieko shook her head. “I’m sorry, I--”

“Come on…!” Jet approached with a frown. “You’re our only lead, you can at least try, right?”

Albert spoke up again. “Even just small things you’ve seen or heard would be a big help.”

Rieko crossed her arm, hugging herself. “I really don’t want to think about this anymore! Please, just forget about it and I’ll handle it on my own.”

“Alright, alright, that’s enough now!” Chang shook his head. “We’ll just have to go about this some other way. No need to tell us to forget about it when we’re already this far along!”

“Please--”

A gasp from Francoise cut off the conversation. She had been keeping her focus on any approaching sounds or sights the entire time, to ensure they weren’t caught off guard again. And now? It seemed she was picking up on something.

“Someone’s approaching… I can hear three sets of footsteps coming from the north.” She pointed her finger and they all turned, expecting to see that Bijinder, possibly with Hakaider and one of the other androids Rieko had mentioned.

Approaching, however, were three unknown beings. For a moment, Joe thought it was the three Rieko had mentioned being rebuilt that hadn’t made themselves seen… But then he noticed one was gripping his arm, the appendage barely hanging on by a few wires.

“J…” Rieko’s eyes went wide and without a moment’s pause went running towards the men. “Jiro…!”

She wrapped her arms around the man leading the three, sobs wracking her body as the other two approached. The shorter of the other two joined in on the hug with an exclamation of ‘hey, don’t forget about me!’ while the other stood there, expression blank.

They all shared a look before Joe started towards them, guard up. “Rieko, do you know these three…?”

Rieko finally pulled herself away from the man, Jiro, and looked back to Joe. “Oh, yes… These are Jiro, Ichiro, and Rei. They’re all Kikaider units…” She gestured to each of the brothers as she shared their names. “Ichiro and Rei are the ones I mentioned as having been rebuilt, but… I didn’t know Jiro was still around.”

“Yeah, well Dromeda lied to us and said he was destroyed!” Ichiro spoke up, voice loud and boisterous. “I knew we shouldn’t have listened to someone who looks so lame…”

“We had no reason to think he survived when we didn’t.” Rei spoke up with a shrug. “There was nothing strange enough about his story to make us question what he was saying.”

Joe blinked a few times, the only thing really sticking being the fact this Dromeda man wasn’t above lying and these two could possible share more information if they were questioned.

“Um…” He spoke up, rubbing the back of his neck. “I know this is sudden, but we were told about this Doctor Dromeda and my friends and I were planning on trying to do something about it. Could you give us more information?”

Rei looked over at him. “We’ll take care of it on our own. We already have a plan, you can all go home.”

“You already have a plan?” Joe blinked a few times. “But--”

“Yeah. We even have the perfect Hakaider bait.” Ichiro gestured at Jiro. “So as long as he doesn’t nearly cut his arm off again, we’ll have a handle on this!”

“We can at least help you--”

He was cut off again, though this time it wasn’t by any words. Instead, Jiro began to stagger, sparks popping around his arm. Before anyone could even ask what was wrong, he was falling face first towards the sand.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still slowly chipping away at this fic aha--

Jiro was dizzy when he fell towards the sand on the beach. He was starting to think that leaving the arm barely connected at been a bad idea, maybe he should have asked Ichiro to rip it off the rest of the way… Too late for that now, though.

He expected to fall all the way into it, but instead, he fell against a chest. When he looked up, he expected to see Rei or maybe Rieko, but it was that guy who’d been trying to get them to let him and his friends help.

“Are you alright?” He was being frowned at…

“Rip my arm off, please.” He didn’t think twice about his request. “It’ll bother me less than way and I can get it fixed.”

“We have Doctor Gilmore right here if you need it fixed to feel better--”

“No way!” Jiro heard Ichiro speak up. “We’ll have Komyoji fix it, he knows more about Jiro’s body than any doctor you’d have with you, anyway!”

“Agreed.” Rei walked over to them and lifted his brother away from the guy. “It’s better for someone who knows our schematics to do it.”

“But--”

“Joe!” Rieko was in front of Jiro, shaking her head now (and Jiro just barely registered the name ‘Joe’ into his database of names). “Please, just listen to them. They’re his brothers, they know what’s best for him.”

“Please…” Jiro looked around Rieko to Joe. “Please rip my arm off still.”

Joe seemed hesitant for a moment, but soon enough, he was gripping Jiro’s arm in his hands. It didn’t take more than a second of pulling for the rest of the wires to come loose, allowing the arm to detach completely. As soon as his body wasn’t trying in vain to send electrical currents to the arm, he felt better.

“Thank you.” He gave him a soft smile, hopefully assuring him that it was the right choice to listen to him. “Now I think we can actually talk this through… The whole, uh, you and your friends wanting to do something about this.”

“Ah yeah.” Joe nodded. “We have some experience with things like this and we all have plenty of skills I’m sure would help you all out, so I think we could be a big help.”

“Oh come on…!” Ichiro groaned, shaking his head. “We don’t need his help, Jiro!”

“Maybe we do, though.” He looked at his brother with a frown. “Look at what Saburo was able to do to me. More people helping out might be enough to keep him and anyone else we have to fight from overwhelming us.”

“...He has a point.” Rei then turned to look at Rieko. “Are they trustworthy?”

Rieko nodded. “As far as I can tell, yes. They’re very open to helping and haven’t done anything to make me think trusting them would be a mistake.”

Ichiro scoffed. “But we can’t be totally sure--”

A blonde woman, along with a group of foreigners, ran up to them at the point. She seemed worried as she grabbed Joe’s arm with a frown. “Joe, I hear someone else coming, I think it’s that Bijinder!”

“Bijinder…” Ichiro frowned. “This isn’t gonna go well if she wants to fight us.”

“Maybe she’ll back down if she sees Jiro.” Rei spoke up. “If not, you should all be ready for quite the fight.”

“We saw some of what she could do before.” A man with silver hair spoke next. “As long as she doesn’t have much else up her sleeve, we should be fine.”

“Depends on what you saw.”

“No time to talk about it!” A man with quite the nose turned back to everyone. “She’s here!”

Standing there was Bijinder, definitely looking annoyed and ready to fight. Jiro moved forward, through the grouping of strangers as quickly as possible. He needed to talk to her before she started actually fighting… By then, he was sure it would be too late.

“Bijinder… Please, stop!” He watched her freeze and morph back into her human form. “We should help each other, not fight.”

“Jiro…? I thought you were…!” She ran forward, squishing his cheeks with her brow furrowed. “Oh, that Dromeda…!”

She continued to press his cheeks in her hands, though it was starting to risk cracking his face. “Uh… Mieko? Can you please stop?”

She blinked a few times, pulling her hands back. “Ugh, I should have known he was lying about you!”

“I mean… It’s not like you were there when everything with Gill… Came to a head.” An ache ran through Jiro’s chest as he spoke. “I don’t know where you were, but you weren’t anywhere near me, so there was no way to know I survived.”

Mieko frowned, a frustrated grunt escaping her. “Ugh… I should have known, still. Dromeda made me, I’ve spent enough time with him that I should know when he’s up to something… I bet Waruder even caught on before me… Just the thought of him knowing more than me makes my skin crawl!”

“Now, I’m sure you’re talking about something very important, miss…” A bald man approached, hand on his chest. “But could you maybe explain a little more for those of us who’re out of the loop?”

Mieko stared at the man for a moment before looking back to Jiro. “Who’s that?”

“I don’t know his name, but, uh… A friend?” Jiro scratched his cheek with his still attached hand. “He seems to be on our side, at least.”

“Oh, that’s right, 009 hasn’t had the chance to introduce us all to you yet… In that case, allow me.” He gave a bow that came with such a flourish that Jiro had to take a step back. “You may call me Great Britain, it’s a pleasure!”

Mieko soon enough had turned on her charm again. It was almost scary how easily she could use this weapon of hers. “The pleasure is mine~! I’d love to continue introductions, but it looks like Jiro is in need of some maintenance!”

“Well, now that we’ve agreed to work with each other…” Joe finally twisted through his friends to stand in front of them. “Doctor Gilmore can fix you at our home, since he has the materials for it.”

“Your home won’t be safe for a while.” Mieko shook her head, a frown on her face. “Waruder and Hakaider are sure to go sniffing around there when Rieko and I don’t show up back at the base.”

“Besides, even if we’re working together…” Jiro once against scratched his cheek. “I’d rather my creator or his daughter fix me… M-maybe his daughter, since I know he’s busy right now.”

The woman from Joe’s group was next to speak again. “Is his daughter in town? And will you be able to get there without being seen?”

Jiro thought for a moment. “Actually… I was hoping you could all help us with that part. Come with us and while I’m being fixed, they can fill you in in exchange for you helping cover up the fact I’m missing an arm?”

The group all looked across each other and in that moment, Jiro got quite the shock.  _ “It might be best for us to do that. We need as much information as possible.” _

Ichiro was clearly also caught off guard, a yell escaping him. “W-who was just talking?!”

_ “I was.”  _ The baby in the arm’s of the old man Jiro guessed was Doctor Gilmore held up a little hand.  _ “I’m communicating with you all telepathically, seeing as I can’t speak to you normally, this is the easiest way to hold a conversation.” _

Ichiro was still trying to process this somehow when Rei made a small noise of understanding. “I see. You all have more up your sleeve than I expected… Let’s go, you can explain all of this when we know Jiro will be fixed.”


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I dunno how to feel abt this chapter but woohoo, here it is.... I love Waruder even tho he really honestly is lame lol (in the manga, idk abt the Toku yet)

In one hotel room, currently, Doctor Gilmore was assisting the young Mitsuko Komyoji in repairing Jiro’s arm while Doctor Komyoji sat nearby working on some device the cyborgs weren’t told a thing about. In the other, were all the said cyborgs, the rest of the androids, and two humans… Humans Joe wasn’t sure should be allowed to know anything, for their own safety.

But little Masaru insisted on staying, as did the detective Hanpei Hattori. Apparently they’d be involved in what happened to Jiro before and felt they had a right to know… Joe and the others just decided they had to keep as much information about themselves away from them as possible.

“Alright… So what else can you tell us about this Dromeda chap?” G.B. was the first to speak, arms crossed as he leaned against the wall. “Or that SHADOW group he worked for, anything helps!”

“SHADOW was trying to build a weapon of mass destruction, Armageddon God.” Rei spoke first. “The plans were on the backs of Professor Gill’s children.”

“And Gill even teamed up with them!” Ichiro scoffed, shaking his head. “Probably thought he was basically undefeatable since he was in Hakaider’s body.”

Pyunma frowned. “Is it possible he’s still in there?”

“No, not a chance.” Mieko shook her head. “When Dromeda found Hakaider the brain had be crushed into fine mush.”

“And how do you know that?” Jet narrowed his eyes, watching her warily.

“Waruder might not trust any of us, but I’m his sister, and he blabbed at me.” She grinned. “There’s a few plus sides to having someone like him around.”

“All of which will fade away once we have to fight him again.” Rei sounded almost uninterested as he pointed that out.

“Doesn’t mean it’s not helpful now, you…!”

Joe cleared his throat, catching their attention again. “So this Doctor Dromeda was working for SHADOW, was he working towards the creation of this Armageddon God…?”

“Definitely!” Mieko nodded.

“He even sent Bijinder here to spy on us and try and get her hands on Gill’s daughter!” Ichiro wasted no time revealing Mieko’s origins to the cyborgs. “...So maybe we should keep a close eye on her.”

“Oh, are you kidding me?” Mieko stomped over to Ichiro. “I made my choice to work with you all--”

“Because of ‘feelings’ we can’t really experience…” Rei shook his head, looking back to the cyborgs. “That really doesn’t matter now. Bijinder chose to become our ally and we have no reason to think she’s changed her mind now.”

“I… see.” Joe glanced back at his friends and frowned. When he was met with worried looks and shrugs, however, they decided to continue on.

“So to get us back on track… You’re saying he was working towards giving his group the most dangerous weapon they could get there hands on.” Albert hummed. “Sounds like he’d be willing to do anything to get a new sponsor, then.”

“Exactly.”

“...Then we know he probably isn’t against hurting any of us to get what he wants.” Junior shook his head. “We’ll have to tread carefully.”

“He might go as far as turning our own tricks against us…” Mieko looked them all over. “So let’s hope you have some tricks he wouldn’t have planned for.”

“Uh, well, we could tell you what we’re capable of, but…” Francoise looked to Hanpei and Masaru. “Only if those two are willing to leave.”

“What…?!” Masaru pouted, standing up and stomping his foot on the ground. “We haven’t been a trouble, you can’t kick us out!”

“Young Masaru is right!” Hanpei was on his feet shortly after. “We were told we could stick around and we’re gonna do just that!”

They were sure ready to fight on this, but Rieko wasted no time swooping in and leading them for the door. “Let’s go get everyone drinks, then. I’m sure they won’t discuss too much while we’re gone.”

They tried to argue, but she was strong enough that they were out the door in no time. After making sure they were down the hall, far enough that they couldn’t easily listen it, it was time to explain what they could each do.

_ “I suppose it would be quickest if I explain it in one go.”  _ Ivan’s voice once again filtered through their heads.  _ “I’m sure you can tell my abilities are--”  _

“Weird mind mumbo jumbo, yeah!” Ichiro shook his head. “That’s neat and all, but what can the rest of you do?”

_ “No need to cut me off like that.”  _ Ivan was clearly annoyed and Joe was almost worried for Ichiro if he pushed it too far.  _ “But fine, let’s move on. 002 has the ability to fly, up to Mach 5 speeds, alongside a prototype accelerator. 003 has enhanced hearing and sight, as well as X-Ray vision. 004’s body is outfitted with multiple weapons--” _

“Ah…” Rei was the one to speak up this time. “That one isn’t really anything new.”

“You telling me you guys are chock-full of weaponry too?” Albert frowned, head tilted to the side.

Rei shrugged. “Only me.”

“More firepower could be helpful though, don’t you think…?” Joe spoke up, wanting to keep this from turning into an argument or something. “Even if it’s been seen before, Doctor Dromeda won’t have seen it from 004 before.”

“He’s got a point there.” Mieko glanced at Joe, though she looked away quickly when she realized he noticed and said nothing more.

“That’s true enough…” Rei looked to Ivan again. “Go ahead and continue, before the others are back.”

_ “I thought you’d never ask.”  _ Ivan was quick to continue his listing of abilities.  _ “005 has enhanced strength and armored skin, 006 has the ability to breathe fire up to three thousand degrees. 007 is especially useful for espionage and infiltration as he’s able to shapeshift into any form, and 008’s ability to breathe underwater can be invaluable when waterways are involved.” _

“That so…?” Mieko hummed. “Maybe we could use 007, then. Dromeda’ll be mad at us for running, but if we make it seem like Waruder or Hakaider are dragging us back…”

“We can catch them off guard.” Pyunma hummed, a hand on his chin. “Not a bad idea.”

“Yeah, yeah… That’s great and all, but what about him?” Ichiro pointed at Joe. “What can he do?”

_ “009 is unique in that most of his abilities are ones you can find in the rest of us. He has the same armored skin as 005 and the underwater breathing capabilities of 008 to some extent. His most useful asset, however, is a finished version of the accelerator I mentioned with 002. He can run about as fast as 002 can fly when using it.” _

“This is all good news…” Mieko kicked her legs out a bit. “Especially if we run into Waruder. None of your abilities can be shot right back at us…”

“Unlike your own.”

“Shut up, Rei…!” Mieko shook her head, a frown on her face. “With all this help, I won’t have to even risk using anything like that, so it’s fine.”

Chang frowned. “Is there something we should know about this Waruder fellow?”

“We might as well tell you what we’re up against.” Mieko sighed. “Waruder got an upgrade to his skin at some point. I can send out signals to mess with other android’s electronic brains or wiring, disabling things as I want, but his skin keeps me from doing that. It’ll just shoot it right back at me… Besides that, his hand can be pretty dangerous, but he’s otherwise pretty unimpressive.”

“No battle form or anything.” Ichiro shook his head. “He’s kinda a joke if you think about it.”

“So he won’t be hard to handle… But what about Hakaider?” Joe frowned. “He put up quite the fight the one time we clashed.”

“Hakaider is a different story entirely…” Ichiro frowned. “He’s got a battle form, for one, and both forms give him access to a weapon that can pierce through our metal bodies no problem.”

“That’s not even mentioning just how strong he is.” Mieko looked at Joe. “You probably remember, right? He’s the type to beat at you until he has the chance to overpower you.”

“I did notice that, yeah…” Joe frowned. “He sounds like he’ll be the biggest problem, then.”

“He does have one weakness, though…” Rei spoke up, arms crossed. “When it comes to destroying Jiro, he seems to have a very one-track mind. As long as he’s with us, he’ll likely be distracted enough that some of us could at least try and sneak up on him.”

“That’d mean using Jiro as bait…” Mieko frowned. “We should wait to see if he’s okay with that.”

“...Good point.” Rei looked to the door as it opened. “Looks like we should stop talking plans for now, anyway.”


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter.... Tbh I'm shocked, I might actually be able to finish this fic lol

“So, our plan is to have this 007 guy lead the way, disguised as Waruder, since we’ll probably see Hakaider first.” Mieko wasted no time starting in on explaining plans that had been made while Jiro was out of commission to him. “But that’s where things get hard… We have to make sure Hakaider doesn’t catch on and go with us.”

“...You want me to distract him, right?” Jiro could already see where this was coming. “Because he’ll want to fight me more than he’d want to follow after you all.”

“Yeah…” Joe gave him a sympathetic look. “It’s the best plan we’ve been able to come up with so far.”

“That’s…” Jiro swallowed hard, looking back at everyone staring at him. Watching him and waiting for his answer. “I…”

He knew Saburo was nothing like Rei or Ichiro. He wasn’t a brother that he had any happy connections to, not someone he was afraid to hurt to get down… But deep down, he was afraid of killing him. Of going to far and showing himself to still be all too ready to kill his own brothers.

Rei’s and Ichiro’s broken forms, the last way he’d seen them before they were rebuilt, flashed in his mind’s eye again. The thought of Saburo looking the same, this time without Gill in his head to make Jiro feel as justified, this time with a way to handle it without destruction being necessary…

He felt sick, dizzy. All the eyes on him were making it impossible to think of what to say. He knew he had to say yes, that he had to distract Saburo. Had to get him down long enough to implant a partial Conscience Circuit within him… He needed to push the worry in his mind to the side.

But he couldn’t, he couldn’t do it now. When the cyborg woman Francoise took a step towards him, panic seized him and he was out the door without a second thought. The slam of it echoed through the hallway, a few people opening their doors and peeking to see what was going on… Including the door right next door.

“Jiro…!” Mitsuko was by his side, Masaru not far behind. “Are you alright?”

“...No, I’m not.” He couldn’t bring himself to even lie. “I’m scared, Mitsuko. I’m not sure I can do this.”

“Well… Of course you can do this!” Masaru spoke up, moving to hug Jiro as tightly as he could. “You’ve always protected people and done your best!”

“But I’ve never been afraid that I wouldn’t be able to stop myself, though.” He looked at his hands, trying to ignore the red he swore he saw on them. “I’ve never been afraid I wouldn’t be able to spare my own brother.”

“Oh Jiro…” Mitsuko gave him a worried frown. “Is it because of that Submission Chip…?”

He nodded. “I have no trouble killing my brothers now… Even if I have a way to handle it without it getting there. It’s not like when I didn’t have a choice…” And it terrified him.

“Jiro…!”

“Well, isn’t Saburo bad…?” Masaru kicked at the ground with a frown. “It’s not like you have to hurt Rei or Ichiro or something…!”

“But I don’t want to destroy anyone anymore!” The words came out louder than he meant them to. “I just want to live a normal life with you two and the doctor! But if I destroy again, I don’t know if I ever can!”

“Jiro…” Mitsuko reached a hand out towards him and he recoiled. “I’m sure it’ll be fine…! I know you can control yourself, you…”

The door behind Jiro began to creak open and, without a second though, he ran off. He couldn’t stand the thought of talking about the plan anymore right now, especially when he was sure he was being checked on after his loud outburst. He didn’t want to explain.

But he heard heavy footsteps following after him. Whoever stepped out of the room to check on him was following him now. He closed his eyes tightly, speeding up and skipping over the steps of the stairs as he went.

“Wait!” Joe’s voice hit his ears. “Please don’t run! I just wanna talk to you!”

Jiro didn’t stop running until he was standing in front of the hotel. He was almost tempted to keep going, hop on his bike and drive away… But he forced himself to stay where he was. He couldn’t run forever.

“Jiro…!” Joe came to a stop next to him, breathing heavily. “I didn’t think about the fact you’d be able to run that fast…”

“That so…?” Jiro frowned, turning to look at Joe. “I guess I’m good at running.”

Joe bit his lip. “This… It’s been hard on you, hasn’t it?”

“Yeah.”

Quiet settled on them for a moment before Joe once again spoke up. “I’m sorry… I feel that ever since I was turned into a cyborg that things just go wrong in my proximity.”

“No, that’s not it.” Jiro shook his head. “Misfortune has followed me since I was made. That’s the fate of something not quite human and not quite robot…” Even if he was more human now than he had been before.

“I guess neither of us are very lucky then, huh?” Joe gave a sad laugh, looking at his feet. “Us meeting might be scary, if that's the case.”

“It might… Or maybe our bad luck’ll cancel out on each other…” Jiro gave him a forced smile. “...Though, uh…”

“Francoise told me what you were talking about in the hall.” Joe admitted as Jiro trailed off. “If you’re worried that you’ll end up going too far if you distract Hakaider… I can do it instead. He doesn’t care about me or anything, but I fought him once, so I might be able to keep him on his toes long enough that--”

“No!” Jiro grabbed Joe by his shoulders. “I can’t let you do that! Saburo is dangerous!”

“Well, we need someone to distract him and if you don’t think you can do it, I will.” Joe gently removed the hands from his shoulders. “We have to stop this before things get any worse.”

Jiro knew he was right, and he hated that. He hated that they had to do something and, that if he couldn’t do it, someone had to distract Saburo. The thought of anyone else taking the risk of earning the cyborg’s ire, however, made him sick to his stomach.

“I can do it. I can face him… I just don’t know for how long.” He finally spoke again, looking Joe in the eye. “If I think I’m going too far, I’ll have to stop myself.”

Joe seemed worried when he heard that, but he nodded. “If you’re sure, I can’t stop you.”

Jiro took a deep breath, calming the rest of his nerves to the best of his ability. “Don’t worry, I am.”


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter and sliiiight edits to the ones that came before it. Nothing worth re-reading if you're already here tho lmao.... I like Francoise, she's soft and good. Maybe I just have a weakness for the number 3

Eventually, the plan was solidified. After Jiro distracted Saburo, the others would go on, Great Britain taking on the form of the enemy cyborg to trick Waruder. It’d hopefully be fairly fight-free… But before they could do any of that, they needed to get some rest.

They’d been able to rent out the last empty room so it wouldn’t be squeezing nineteen people into a total of two rooms, but it was still sort of a tight fit. Joe was stuck staring at either Jiro’s sleeping face or Francoise’s back…

Seeing as Jiro’s face just made him worry about the android and what would happen tomorrow, he chose to stare at Francoise’s back.

The plan was so simple, there wasn’t much that could go wrong so long as they all played their roles well… They’d be able to stop Dromeda and all go back to their normal lives, parting ways as necessary.

But Joe still couldn’t sleep.

Every possible thing that could go wrong was running through his head, especially everything that could go wrong with Jiro’s part of the plan. What if he couldn’t bring himself to fight anymore and he was destroyed? Or what if that somehow made Hakaider lose interest in the fight?

They had just met, but he would hate for Jiro to end up in a situation like that just because of the plan they had come up with. Maybe he should have pushed harder towards being the one to try and keep Hakaider distracted…

“Joe…” Francoise’s voice was soft, but it still startled him. “Are you still awake?”

“Was it that obvious…?” He scratched his cheek, cheeks flushing in embarrassment. “Sorry if I was keeping you up.”

“No, no…” She turned to face him. “I’m having trouble sleeping, too… I’m worried about tomorrow.”

Even though he was on the same boat, he decided to try and make her feel a bit better. “It’s alright. I’m sure things will turn out just fine.”

He could see her frowning in the darkness. “I know that, but I feel so… Helpless. I wouldn’t be much use in a fight and I can’t see or hear  _ anything _ that would be of use to the rest of you…”

“Come on now… You’ll be doing plenty.” He returned the frown, though his was laced with more worry for her than anything. “Our plan needs you just as much as it needs 007 or Jiro…”

She noticed the way he trailed off, if the sigh she released was anything to go by. “Joe… Are you worried about Jiro?”

“I am…” He sat up, unable to continue laying there. “I’m not sure he can actually do his part, not without getting hurt in the process.”

Francoise followed suit, placing a hand on his shoulder. “Joe… You said he seemed certain about doing it, didn’t you?”

“Yeah… I did.” That didn’t make his worry falter at all, though. “But I’m still just not sure.”

Francoise looked away from him for a moment, and he was pretty sure she had closed her eyes. “Why don’t you stay with him, then?”

“What?”

“You’re worried about his well being, aren’t you? Why not stay with him when it’s time? Keep an eye on him so you don’t have to worry as much.”

“But I have all of you I need to look out for…” Joe frowned. “You all are like a family to me, I can’t let you all go ahead of me when I could be with you.”

“You know you can trust us.” She squeezed his shoulder. “As long as we all believe in each other, we’ll be fine.”

His frown slowly turned into an appreciative smile. “Thank you… You’re right. We should--”

“Hey…!” Masaru’s voice broke their conversation and they both glanced towards the bed.

He was now sitting up, instead of cuddling up next to Mitsuko and Ivan as he had been before. It was clear he hadn’t been up for long, though, Joe kept catching him rubbing the sleepiness from his eyes. Had they woken him up…?

“I’m sorry…” Francoise was soon enough on her knees, patting his head. “We didn’t mean to be so loud.”

“Well you guys should stop talking and should try and sleep…” A yawn escaped him. “You might wake up others if you keep going.”

“We wouldn’t want to do that… We’ll do our best to sleep, right Joe?” Francoise looked at him with a forced smile.

He returned the same smile. “Yeah. We were just a little nervous.”

Masaru sighed, swinging his legs over the bed and standing up. “You might be nervous, but you still need to sleep, you know. If I don’t sleep before a big lesson, I end up doing really badly.”

“Oh…?” Francoise tilted her head to the side.

Joe scratched his cheek. “Are you trying to say things won’t go well if we don’t rest…?”

“Yup!” He nodded surely. “If you guys are tired, it’ll be harder to focus, and I’m sure focus is really important to the stuff you guys have to do. You have to be sneaky and stuff, after all, right?”

“You’re right, but shouldn’t you be trying to get some sleep too?” Francoise’s put her hands on his shoulders to try and lead him back to the bed. “It’ll be important for you to be well-rested too.”

“Nuh-uh!” Masaru shook his head. “I’m just a kid, the only person who’ll be more useless than me is the baby.”

That was right, he didn’t realize that said baby was actually smarter than most of them… They had to make sure it stayed like that.

“Don’t be silly…” Francoise was standing now, picking up Masaru and placing him back in bed. “From what I’ve heard from Jiro, you’re very helpful.”

“Really…?!” His voice began to raise and Joe put a finger to his lips.

“Remember, Masaru, we need to be quiet.” He held in an amused laugh. “We don’t want to take anyone else before we turn in for the night.”

“Oh…!” Masaru covered his mouth with a gasp. “You’re right, I’m sorry!”

“It’s fine…” Francoise moved to lay again and the guys followed her lead. “Goodnight, we can all talk more in the morning.”

“Mmhmm…!” Masaru pulled the covers over himself again. “Sleep well, guys, you need the rest.”

“Yeah…” Joe nodded, letting his eyes close after staring at Francoise’s back for a moment. “Goodnight.”


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter lmao;;;; I'm shocked this has broken 100 hits, wow

“Alright, here we go.” Jiro turned to look at the cyborgs and androids going with the group, swallowing hard. They had put fake chains on the androids Dromeda had rebuilt, G.B. holding the chains as he took on the form of Waruder… It was scary how spot on he could be from Rei just spitting out specifics and Mieko poking fun.

Francoise, Ivan, and the doctors would be staying behind, near the opening of the path. A little ways away were their bikes and Hanpei’s car. Hanpei, Mitsuko, and Masaru waiting to help with any evacuation or removal that could be needed…

Jiro just hoped there wouldn’t be a need for emergency evacuation.

“Alright, then.” G.B. cleared his throat and gave them all a cheeky grin. “We’ll get started on moving in. The rest of you do make sure to stay quiet as you follow.”

“Don’t worry about that!” Jet gave a friendly punch to G.B.’s shoulder. “You know we can handle that.”

“Just reaffirming it.” And with that, he started off, the androids following after him and quietly giving him directions.

Joe turned to look at Jiro, falling back to walk in the back with him as the others started to quietly follow after. “Are you doing alright?”

“Ah, uh… Yes, I’m fine.” He gave a shaky smile. “A bit nervous, but it’ll be fine.”

At least that's what he told himself. He would be able to hold off Saburo for long enough that things could go off without a hitch, right? Maybe if he was brave enough he could even remove a leg to keep him from sounding any sort of alarm…

“Would it be alright if I stay behind to help you?” Joe’s voice was still a whisper as they walked along, not wanting to alert even their own group to the conversation. “It might be easier on you if you’re not doing it alone.”

“Uh…!” Jiro’s eyes widened for a moment. “I--”

He stopped himself from speaking when he realized everyone had come to a halt, grimaces on their faces. He and Joe wasted no time catching up with the group and it was soon enough apparent what the issue was.

Some sort of drones had stopped the group, keeping them from moving forward. That was a bit strange, honestly, because as far as Jiro was concerned, Saburo would be the type to come out all on his own. Not send drones to check on what was going on.

That’s when Waruder stepped into view, a frown on his face. “What kind of trick is that, Bijinder? You trying to replace me with some other android?”

“Waruder…” Mieko’s voice was filled with apprehension. “I thought Hakaider usually patrolled this area.”

“He does, but he insisted we change roles for today. Something about expecting things to be more  _ exciting _ this way…?” Waruder grinned and shrugged. “Looks like he made a good call. How’d you build this hunk of junk to look so much like me, huh?”

G.B., still looking like Waruder, looking more than a little offended. “Excuse--”

Rei slapped a hand over his mouth, making it clear that these chains were nothing. “It isn’t hard when we’re able to recite your appearance fairly easily.”

“You--”

“Now isn’t the time for this, anyway! Our plan is ruined…” Ichiro turned towards the trees. “You guys should just come on out now!”

Jiro felt ichiro doing that wasn’t the best idea, but it was clear things were about to turn into a fight… So they didn’t have much choice. The cyborgs rushed forward and Jiro brought his arms to his shoulders, hitting the switches there.

“Switch on…!”

By the time Kikaider entered the fray, the others with battle forms had assumed them. The drones were unending, pouring into the clearing with vigor as they all took them on. At some point, G.B. had regained his normal form, at least. So no confusion as to who Waruder was…

Speaking of Waruder, he was barking orders at some of the robots that came running up before starting towards what had to be the base. Kikaider, currently under assault by a swarm of drones, let out a yell.

“Don’t let him get away!”

Bijinder’s attention snapped towards her brother. “Hey, you, 007! Turn into a dog and head him off!”

G.B. blinked a few times. “A dog?”

“Just do it!”

He nodded and soon enough, he’d taken on the form of a cute, cuddly dog. He dashed towards Waruder, coming to a stop in front of him. Kikaider shared a look with Kikaider 00 and Kikaider 01, but they simply shrugged. Looked like they didn’t know what was going on, either.

But then it became fairly obvious, Waruder letting out a shriek and backing away from G.B. as quickly as he could. G.B. followed after him, trotting along happily and totally drawing Waruder’s attention to him. Drones began rushing to his side to try and help him and Kikaider saw an opening.

“Let’s go!” He ran through the clearing, towards the opening leading to the path to the base. His brothers followed after, as did Joe and a couple of the other cyborgs. Others tried to follow, but drones were quick enough to block off their path again.

“Go on ahead!” Albert yelled to them as soon as he noticed them all staring back at them. “We can handle ourselves here!”

“Please just try and come back safely!” Rieko looked at them, robotic eyes shining.

“Waruder and these drones won’t be that hard!” Bijinder’s voice was full of confidence.

Jet nodded. “We might even catch up to you all before too long!”

“You heard them!” Kikaider 01 grabbed Kikaider by the arm and started moving. “Let’s go kick this dumb scientist’s ass!”

“Ah, yeah…” He nodded and started moving on his own again, everyone else following suit.

“That Hakaider will probably be our next enemy, right?” Pyunma spoke next, a frown on his face. “Should we try and come up with a new plan on how to deal with him?”

“No.” Kikaider shook his head. “No. I can still distract him, the rest of you get into the base and stop Dromeda.”

“Will you be alright doing that? There won’t be an escape if you feel the need to fall back.” Kikaider 00 was right, and that didn’t make Kikaider feel very good about any of this…

“I have to be alright.” He did his best to steel himself. “If I don’t distract Hakaider, we won’t be able to get to Dromeda or back to the others quickly enough.”

Junior hummed, closing his eyes for a moment. “It sounds like you’ve made peace with whatever was scaring you about it before.”

“I guess so…” He nodded. “I had to, for everyone else’s sake.”

Joe put a hand on his shoulder, giving him a small and encouraging smile. “Don’t worry, it’ll all turn out alright.”

Kikaider hoped he was right.

They continued walking, the air tense and full of worry. How were the others doing? Were they handling it as well as they made it seem they would? It seemed none of them were sure, and no one wanted to say it.

Soon enough, the base was in view, and standing in front of the entrance was Saburo, a grin on his face. “You’re finally here, Kikaider! And would you look at that, you’re already ready to fight.”

“Yeah…” He dropped into a fighting stance. “I hope you’re ready, because you’re not taking off my arm that easily this time.”

He chuckled, light breaking out on his face, soon enough engulfing him. Soon enough, Saburo’s form was replaced by that of Hakaider. A pure black body, yellow highlights standing out, as did his glowing red eyes and red mouth. In the glass dome on his head, a brain as always.

“Come then, Kikaider.” He gestured for Kikaider to make the first move. “Let’s see what you can really do!”


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 14.......... Getting closer and closer to the end

Joe watched Junior and Kikaider 01 work together to rip the door off the base as Kikaider and Hakaider faced each other. He balled his hands into fists, looking to Pyunma with a frown. “I’m staying behind to help.”

“Got it.” Pyunma nodded. “Be careful, 009.”

Kikaider 00 looked over at them. “I suggest going for the arms and the legs.”

“Thanks.” Joe watched the four of them disappear into the base before turning to face Hakaider himself. 

Hakaider barely seemed to register him at first, his attention still fully on Kikaider. “You can’t win this on your own,  _ brother _ ?”

Kikaider looked over at Joe, a frown on his face. “You should go with the others! We don’t have the time we thought we had before--”

“No, I said I was going to help you with Hakaider and that’s not going to change now!” Joe shook his head. “If we work together, we can both join the others soon enough!”

“I….” Kikaider gave Joe a nod. “Thank you.”

Hakaider scoffed. “I should have known you’d avoid fighting me, Kikaider. Maybe I should go find that Komyoji girl, or our other brothers. Maybe if I hurt or break them enough you’ll give me what I want.”

The anger began to nearly radiate off of Kikaider. “Don’t you dare…!”

“If you don’t want that to happen…” Hakaider chuckled. “You should take me on on your own!”

“You can’t--”

Kikaider help up a hand, cutting Joe off. “Fine. Joe, please, go on ahead with the others.”

Joe didn’t know what to say. He wanted to try and help, but Kikaider was already rushing at Hakaider on his own. He watched, freezing as he watched them clash, the sound of metal on metal piercing. He couldn’t leave Kikaider alone, but what should he do?

He watched them for now, Hakaider driving himself into Kikaider repeatedly. No matter how much he pushed, though, Kikaider was keeping his balance (for now). He pushed back, trying to hit and punch directly at his chest.

“What’s wrong, Kikaider?!” Hakaider’s voice was full of a mocking venom as he drove a foot into Kikaider’s chest with a clash. “It’s not like I have Doctor Komyoji’s brain in my head this time, so you have nothing to worry about! Show me what you’ve  _ really  _ got.”

Kikaider kept quiet, focusing on not stumbling too far from the kick. It didn’t help, though, Hakaider’s arm connecting with his neck and knocking him to the ground.

“Come on, Kikaider!” He drove his foot into the other’s head and Joe could hear gears in Kikaider’s head straining. “I know you can do better than this,  _ much  _ better!”

For a moment, Kikaider lay still and Joe felt his heart in his throat. Had he given up?! But Kikaider began to move again, pulling his head up with a newfound force and pushing Hakaider back. It almost seemed to Joe like Kikaider would be able to turn the tide of the battle…

And then he saw Hakaider pull out a gun from a holster on his hip. Just looking at it told him that it was  _ dangerous _ , and based off the fact Kikaider became even more on guard, he was right.

“Finally starting to make this fun, are you, Kikaider?” Hakaider tilted his head to the side before pointing the gun away from Kikaider and towards Joe. “Let’s make sure you keep it up by removing the distraction.”

“No…!”

He pulled the trigger and Joe wasted no time activating Acceleration Mode, pulling his own gun free as he moved behind Hakaider. As he returned himself to normal speeds, he remembered what Kikaider 00 had told him…

And he shot off Hakaider’s arm without a second thought.

Hakaider stared at it, his expression not even shocked. Instead, he just slowly turned to look at Joe, face as blank as one would expect from a robot. He pointed to his neck, staring Joe down.

“If you’re going to copy Gill, you might as well finish the job.”

Joe furrowed his brow, confusion washing over him. Had he lost his head before he was rebuilt? And if he had, what did that have to do with losing an arm…?

He didn’t have long to think on it, however, as Hakaider came charging at him, pressing him against the wall of the base with enough force to leave a dent. His weapon dropped to the ground as Hakaider’s arm pressed against his neck, trying to choke the life out of him.

That’s when a shot from Hakaider’s own weapon shot out and knocked his other arm to the floor.

“Using Hakaider Shot against me…” Hakaider let out an angry laugh as he turned back towards Kikaider, who was still grasping the gun like a lifeline. “I never would have thought you had it in you!”

He staggered towards Kikaider again and Joe leaped for his own gun, aiming it at one of his legs. He took a deep breath, doing his best to keep his aim on track with Hakaider’s leg (easier said than done with how much he was stumbling around), and pulled the trigger.

It seemed Kikaider had the same idea, and soon enough both of his legs were gone from under him, the rest of his body falling to the ground with a thud. Kikaider was barely fast enough to cushion the damage that could have come to the top of the cyborg’s head.

“You do all this and you stop me from dying?” Hakaider’s tone was full of irritation as Joe ran to Kikaider’s side. “What’s your goal, then?”

“You won’t like it if I tell you.” Kikaider shook his head. “It’s best you find out later.”

“Not if I smash this brain to bits as soon as you leave to help the others, I won’t.” 

Kikaider was silent for a moment before letting out a quiet sigh. “If you really need to know… Doctor Komyoji plans on inserting a Conscience Circuit into you. He left room in their in his initial building of you, and… Well, it might help you find something to do with yourself other than destroying me. So we won’t have to destroy you.”

Hakaider was silent for a moment before an explosion of anger bubbled to the top. “I’d sooner die than let something like that happen to me! Just kill me now! Or I’ll do it myself…!”

Kikaider and Joe shared a look, one full of worry. What would they do to keep him from doing that…? Kikaider clearly didn’t want to be the reason he ended up dead or destroyed, so they couldn’t just risk it…

Joe put his hands to his scarf and began to remove it. “I have an idea…!”


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two more chapters to go, huh? I might reach my New Year Resolution to finish a multi-chapter fic, pfft

Kikaider watched Joe tie Hakaider’s neck against a tree with his scarf. His brother, try as he might, couldn’t move his head enough to cause any damage to himself and the scarf didn’t seem to give at all. Kikaider didn’t know what the scarf was made of, but that was pretty damn impressive.

“There!” Joe moved away and Kikaider placed Hakaider’s limbs next to him, putting Hakaider Shot back into its holster. “We should catch up with the others now.”

“Yeah, let’s go…” Kikaider stood, glancing back at Hakaider. “We’ll be back for you soon.”

Hakaider scoffed, straining his head again. “I’d rather you just leave me to rot!”

Kikaider wanted to say something, but Joe’s hand on his shoulder reminded him of what was important right now. He could deal with Hakaider later.

“Don’t worry, I won’t let it get to me. Let’s go.” He started for the door, Joe following after him.

They walked into the base, on guard and expecting more of those drones to be crawling around. However, it was more a case of following the line of broken robots and parts splayed on the ground. With someone like Kikaider 01 ahead of them, Kikaider couldn’t be that surprised. 

“Hopefully they didn’t run into too much trouble…” Joe furrowed his brow as they stepped around a pile of parts that seemed to still be steaming after destruction. “I’d hate for anything else to go wrong.”

“I’m sure they’re fine. Kikaider 01 can be hotheaded, but the rest can keep him from doing anything too risky.” At least, that was what he liked to believe. It made things a little less stress-inducing…

“Ah, you’re probably right! I know 005 and 008 can be trusted.” He gave Kikaider a smile. “And Kikaider 00 seems to be all about logic, so he won’t get ahead of himself, I’m sure.”

“Exactly.” He could trust Joe’s friends and his brothers.

They continued in silence from there, following more parts and doors either busted or hacked open. At least there was a little variety, Kikaider thought with a small smile. He had to find small things to keep himself calm.

Soon enough, though, he could hear shouting. A voice he didn’t know well clashed with Ichiro’s, though the words couldn’t be made out. He looked to Joe and his face looked about as worried as a face like his could. “We need to hurry.”

“Agreed, let’s go.” Joe gave a nod and started to pick up the pace, running. Kikaider was close behind, sure that things were coming to a head with Doctor Dromeda now.

Soon enough, they were able to at least make out some of what was being said. Words about Dromeda being a ‘total loser freak’ and Ichiro being ‘nothing more than overglorified scrap metal’... It seemed like things were getting nasty and Kikaider was afraid it’d get to violence. 

Soon enough, they entered the right room. Junior was holding Kikaider 01 back while Pyunma and Kikaider 00 stood on either side of Dromeda, ensuring he couldn’t escape. Dromeda looked like a wild animal, ready to lash out and bite as he was overwhelmed… And Kikaider knew he wouldn’t stand much of a chance against them.

“Oh, you have more with you?! You want to ruin my plans so totally?!” Dromeda’s voice was full of hysteria and venom. “You’re worse mistakes than Bijinder! Bigger failures than Waruder!”

“It doesn’t matter what you think we are!” Kikaider 01 snapped, trying to pull free from Junior’s grasp. “We’re taking you down!”

“You should give up on any hopes of a group funding you now.” Kikaider 00’s words were as calm as usual. “Your plan was flawed from the start.”

“Are you fools?!” Dromeda let out a laugh. “I already have a sponsor… Or I will, as long as I get my plan to work! And as long as this base stands, I can try until I succeed.”

“Then we’ll have to wreck the place!” Kikaider 01 wasn’t about to give up. “Whoever you think’ll sponsor you is sure to back out if you have nothing to your name.”

“We can ensure Waruder is out of your reach, as well.” Kikaider 00 shrugged. “Hakaider has likely already abandoned you thanks to Kikaider.”

“What…?!”

“He’s more focused on killing me than he is listening to any orders you could throw at him.” Kikaider sighed. “It’s too bad you couldn’t ask someone like Gill about how he acts, isn’t it? Then you’d know it might not have been in your best interest to rebuild him.”

“W...Well, I’ll just have to make sure that none of you make it out of here, then!” Dromeda made his way for the control panel. “Even if I have to go down as well, you’ll all regret ever coming here.”

Kikaider 01 finally broke free of the grasp holding him back. “I just remembered the perfect way to deal with you!”

Before anyone could move to stop him, he drove the side of his hand into the back of Dromeda’s neck, knocking the man unconscious. That was… A bit anticlimactic, wasn’t it? It worked, but still…

Kikaider 01 picked up the man, throwing him over his shoulder with a huff. “Let’s figure out how to make this place blow and get out of here already!”

Pyunma and Kikaider 00 moved forward to the control panel at that point. They both got to work looking it over and trying to access the system… And soon enough, they were able to set it to blow.

“We have five minutes.” Pyunma looked at them all. “Let’s get going!”

No one had to be told that twice, everyone making it for the entrance as quickly as possible. Kikaider counted down the time in his head as they went. They were at four minutes and thirty seconds when they made it to the entrance.

Without wasting a second, he dashed to Hakaider, untying Joe’s scarf from around his neck and lifting him up over his shoulder. Before he could reach for his limbs or Joe’s scarf, Joe was there, scooping all of the items up and tying them up in the scarf.

“You seem to be in a rush…” Hakaider’s voice had a mocking edge back in it. “Don’t want to risk me blowing up with the base?”

“That obvious we set it to self-destruct?” Kikaider started moving again, following the others away and towards a safer distance.

“Dromeda is as stubborn a fool as Gill was, the only way you’d be able to get him to stop would be taking away all of his toys…” Hakaider paused for a moment before chuckling darkly. “Make sure you don’t leave him a robotic body to implant his brain into this time.”

Kikaider grimaced, not happy to be reminded of anything involving Gill in Hakaider’s body. “You knew about that?”

“I know a lot more than you think I do, brother.”

Kikaider decided against trying to question him more at the moment and kept moving. He’d just wait until he had a Conscience Circuit and no way to lie to him to ask. It’d make things easier to get the full story that way.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's like 2:30 in the morning, I can't sleep, and I decided to write more. All that's left: the epilogue.

Hakaider was happy to try and egg Kikaider into hurting or killing him as they went, clearly still very turned off of the idea of getting a Conscience Circuit being installed. Kikaider 00 pointing out that if he chose to try and kill Kikaider of his own free will later, he could still do it, didn’t change that.

“Kikaider’s acting more like a human than the machine he really is!” Hakaider had snapped. “For all I know, that stupid circuit will mistake him for one and I won’t be able to do anything to him.”

“Then maybe you can take up a hobby that isn’t destructive!” Kikaider 01 snapped back, a frown on his face. “Or maybe that’d be too much for you.”

“Oh, did I hit a nerve with the failed prototype?” Hakaider let out a laugh. “I can only imagine--”

“That’s enough.” Joe finally spoke up, a frown on his face as he carried along Hakaider’s limbs (resisting the urge to slap him with his own hand). “For now we all need to focus on leaving and regrouping. Which means you need to be quiet.”

Hakaider scoffed, but said nothing else, simply turning his head away from Joe. That worked for him, it’d keep Kikaider 01 from flinging Dromeda at him in anger or something. That would just get messy…

Soon enough, they were back at the clearing where they’d left the others who’d gone along with the group. By the looks of it, the drones had all been destroyed and Waruder was just as armless as Hakaider.

Rieko was holding his arms as he frowned at her, unable to move any closer thanks to both Bijinder and G.B. keeping him from moving that far. It seemed the group left behind handled everything well enough, thank goodness.

“009, 008, 005!” Jet grinned at them, clearly happy to see them all looking fairly unscathed. “We got worried when we heard and explosion and didn’t see you all coming.”

“There was a bit of a hold up…” Pyunma gestured towards Kikaider and Hakaider. “I guess it’s hard for even an android to run with an unhappy passenger.”

“Dead weight isn’t much better!” Kikaider 01 shook his head, obviously angry that no one else wanted to take the unconscious Dromeda.

“Even Dromeda…!” Waruder looked away, kicking at the ground. “I should’ve known not to trust him to make this work!”

“You really should’ve!” Bijinder snickered, slapping him on the back. “Maybe you’ll learn to trust your sister after this, eh, Waruder?”

“Not a chance in hell.”

Albert sighed, shaking his head. “I’d hate to interrupt some good old sibling arguing, but we could probably head back now.”

“The sooner, the better, I’m sure there’s plenty of loose ends we need to tie up!” Chang nodded, arms crossed. “For one, we have to make sure our house is intact past the door!”

Bijinder faltered a bit at that. “Ah… Sorry about that.” 

Chang shook his head. “You can just apologize later by helping us put the new one up! Let’s go!”

With that, they all started moving again, every android phasing back into their more human forms. No point in risking some random passerby who came to check out the explosion seeing them, after all.

Of course, that made Waruder’s clearly mechanical arms and shoulders as well as Hakaider’s everything a problem still, but two problems was better than seven. Maybe they’d be lucky enough to avoid people, anyway.

Thankfully the Doctors, Francoise, and Ivan were in view soon enough. Francoise wasted no time running towards them, relief clear on her face. “I heard the explosion and more sounds started coming to me! I’m glad to see you’re all alright!”

“It was a bit scary at times, but we made it through.” Joe gave her a smile, putting a hand on her shoulder. “Now we just have to figure out where to go from here….”

“Well, I’m going to check on the house! There’s paths from here I can take to get there easily enough!” Chang nodded. “Would anyone like to come with me.”

“Ah…” Mieko rose her hand awkwardly. “I will. So I can see what I’ll have to do to help with the door… Waruder, too, until I can figure out how to get him into town without arms.”

“If that’s the case, at least a few of us should head into town to get a new door and some hinges. I didn’t get the best look, but I’m sure the old one is ruined.” G.B. spoke up next. “I’ll be sure to pick a wonderful replacement.”

“That’s fine and all, but we need to do something with Dromeda, too!” Ichiro held the unconscious man out in front of him. “Take him to one of those human police stations or something.”

“I also need Hakaider to be moved to the hotel as quickly as possible.” Den spoke up then. “The sooner the Conscience Circuit is inserted, the better.”

“By all means, take your time.” Hakaider spoke up again. “The longer you take, the more time I have to think about how I’ll kill Kikaider for this.”

“Well, we can all split off, then!” Chang spoke up again, moving to start down the path. “Anyone who wants to help me inspect the damage, this way!”

Mieko, an unhappy Waruder, Junior, and Gilmore followed after him. That was some of the group gone, with a goal in mind, but what about the rest of them? They all needed to get into town, after all.

“I’ll go with Great Britain to help with the door.” Rei looked to the group. “I can take Hakaider’s bike and someone else if they want to go along. We could ask the detective to drop the rest off at the same store.”

“I was hoping we could ask Hanpei to keep an eye on Ichiro when he drops off Dromeda…” Jiro gave an awkward laugh. “I don’t want him upsetting the police.”

Rei thought for a moment. “Ichiro can follow after us and, after Hanpei drops those who want to go door shopping off, head to the police station with him.”

Ichiro grumbled a bit, clearly not happy with the fact he was being babysitted, but after a moment he spoke loud and clear. “Fine, fine. Anyone who wants to go look at boring doors and watch a loser get thrown behind bars, follow me!”

With that, he took off, G.B. and Rei following close behind. After a moment’s pause and some urging from Joe, Francoise followed with Ivan cradled in her arms, as did Albert, Pyunma, and Rieko.

“I suppose that leaves just us…” Den let out a sigh. “Well then, if you could all follow Jiro and I to the hotel, I suppose you can wait or watch Hakaider gain a conscience. 

“A robot gaining something like that sounds interesting…” Jet hummed a bit. “I gotta see if it can really be done.”

Jiro blinked a few times. “But I… Nevermind.”

Joe gave an awkward smile and nodded. “I felt I should probably come along since I, uh, have these.” 

“Oh…” Den blinked a few times. “Yes, that would be a good idea.”

With that, they started towards Jiro’s bike. After settling Den into the side car alongside a (covered) Hakaider, Jet took to the skies and Joe prepared to get there as quickly as possible. It didn’t take too long to make it there, though he couldn’t bring himself to follow Komyoji into the room to watch the robotic implant.

Instead, he stayed outside the room while Jet helped the Doctor by lugging the body and appendages into the area. Looked like he and Jiro would have at least a few moments alone to speak…

“I’m actually surprised…” Jiro had a smile on his face when Joe looked over at him. “Things are turning out better for me than they ever had.”

“I’m surprised too.” Joe looked towards the door after a moment. “Usually the people we fight don’t get to make it out alive… It’s nice to see things turn out better for you and your… Family?”

“Family could be the right word, though I doubt most brothers want each other dead…” Jiro scratched his cheek with an awkward laugh. “Hopefully that will change with this.”

“Yeah…” Joe let his eyes close for a moment, understanding Jiro’s wish to not have to fight endlessly with his sibling. “Hopefully.”


	17. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaaand. Done.

A few weeks had passed and it was time for Jiro and everyone with him to head back to where they’d come from. Most of the cyborgs had made their way back to their own lives by now, leaving Joe and the others who lived in the area alone.

Seeing as he’d said goodbye to all of them, Joe didn’t see an issue in seeing Jiro and his friends and family off. Change and G.B. were too busy with the restaurant to come along and Gilmore had to watch and now sleeping Ivan, but Francoise tagged along and they were able to catch them shortly before they took off.

Hanpei seemed to be giving the Komyojis, along with Rieko a ride; Ichiro had the job of dealing with a very angry Waruder and Mieko; Rei seemed to be taking Saburo’s bike… They were all pretty far away by the time Joe and Francoise got there, but Jiro and Saburo (clearly unhappy about riding in the sidecar with him), were still within reach.

“Oh, you guys came to say goodbye?” Jiro blinked a few times, head tilted to the side. “I know we went through a lot together and kept running into each other after that, but…”

“No point for people like you to care about little old machines like us, is what’s he’s trying to say.” Saburo had made it clear before that he was still, well, a jerk and pretty damn violent, but his comments were still a bit much.

Of course, they bothered Jiro less than they bothered Joe, but still.

“Well, we still went through enough together that we thought we’d wish you a safe journey…” Joe rubbed the back of his neck and smiled at him. “And luck at avoiding things like this in the future.”

“Well, with Doctor Dromeda behind bars for… Something, Hanpei won’t tell me what, I’m sure things will be calm for a while.”

“Sure…” Saburo snorted. “Until a buddy of Gill’s pops up or--”

“Isn’t that enough from you?” Francoise frowned at Saburo, hands on her hips. “If you were really that angry or upset, you’d still be trying to hurt your brother!”

“Wh…!” Saburo sat up in the sidecar. “You don’t know that, you--”

“I might not know for certain, but I sure can guess!” Francoise turned away from him with a sigh. “You might not realize it, but you’re as easy to read as a book.”

“I am not!”

Joe had to agree with Saburo there, but he wouldn’t say anything. Maybe it’d be better for Saburo to stew with the thought of being easy to read for a while, if only because it might save Jiro and company from a headache or two.

Jiro let out a small laugh, shaking his head. “Well, thank you guys for coming to say goodbye. It’s nice to know there’s some friends in this town.”

“Yeah…” Joe held out his hand, Jiro taking it to shake it. “Make sure you say hi if you come around again and we’re still here.”

Jiro nodded. “Will do.”

With that, he (as well as all the others) took off, leaving Joe and Francoise to watch them leave. They waved until they were out of sight, smiles on their faces. It was nice for things to work out, just once.


End file.
